The Diocese of Brownsville released a statement regarding COVID-19 vaccines on Friday. 

The statement comes after the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops said on Tuesday that the Johnson & Johnson vaccine raises questions about moral permissibility.

The Diocese of Brownsville said Catholics "may receive a vaccine developed in these ways when the illness against which the vaccine is directed poses a serious and imminent public health risk, and when there are no accessible alternatives."

Read the Diocese of Brownsville's entire statement regarding COVID-19 vaccines below: 

The Catholic Church opposes the use of cell lines derived and reproduced from aborted children for the development, testing and production of vaccines. Nevertheless, a Catholic may receive a vaccine developed in these ways when the illness against which the vaccine is directed poses a serious and imminent public health risk, and when there are no accessible alternatives.

The current COVID pandemic poses a serious and imminent health risk, and certainly for the foreseeable future, here in the Rio Grande Valley, very few if any of us will have a choice of which vaccine to receive. As vaccines become available Catholics may receive the vaccine accessible to them even if it is derived or produced from tainted cell lines.

As expressed in the recent Statement from the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, under these kinds of circumstances, “it is morally acceptable to receive Covid-19 vaccines that have used cell lines from aborted fetuses in their research and production process.’[1]

If and when the time comes when a variety of different vaccines are readily accessible, a Catholic should opt for those derived in morally acceptable ways or, if these are not available, those least morally compromised.

It is urgent that this pandemic be stopped; the lives of many depend upon it. I urge those who are eligible at this time to receive the vaccine when it becomes available, both for their own good and the good of the wider community