COMPULSORY VACCINATION FOR ANGLICAN PRIESTS

MBABANE – It is now mandatory for the Anglican Church clergy in Southern Africa, including Eswatini, to vaccinate.

This follows reports that the Anglican Church  of Southern Africa’s ruling Provincial Synod voted in favour of the church, making a resolution that COVID-19 vaccinations among the clergy be made mandatory. The resolution was announced by President of the Anglican Church of Southern Africa Dr Thabo Makgoba, who told the synod that in a “deadly pandemic, the right of your neighbour to life inevitably circumscribes your right to do as you like” and asked its members to “to take seriously our prophetic role in society when we debate this matter.”

Resolution

To establish whether this resolution also applied to the Eswatini branch of the Anglican Church, Deacon Bhekindlela Magongo of the Anglican Church was reached for comment. He stated that the developments had been communicated to them as a church the previous week through the Provincial Synod, which they joined virtually. “Among other motions that were passed during the synod was the vaccination one, which we take very seriously as a church. Generally, we encourage and promote that individuals vaccinate for COVID-19,” said the deacon. He further mentioned that the motion was moved for the Archbishop of the Anglican Church, Makgoba, to write to all the bishops of the province (Southern Africa region) to state that as a Provincial Synod, they had resolved to make it mandatory for the clergy to vaccinate. “We have to lead by example as leaders of the church, we can’t be ministering to people who have vaccinated yet we have not,” stated Magongo.

The deacon further mentioned that once a resolution was taken at the Provincial Synod, all countries affiliated to the Anglican Church of Southern Africa are compelled to follow that resolution. The Anglican Church of Southern Africa in a released statement was quoted as having said; “We support the call from the Archbishop (Thabo Makgoba) for the mandatory vaccination of all clergy on the grounds that of necessity they have to be close to other people, they visit vulnerable people to provide pastoral care and numbers of people in our congregations are vulnerable by virtue of age or comorbidities.”

Mandatory

To establish whether other churches would consider making it mandatory for their priesthood to vaccinate, this reporter contacted a pastor, who preferred to be addressed as Mngomezulu, from the Pentecostal Church. Mngomezulu said the current COVID-19 regulations instituted by government, which provide that vaccination was a choice were what they were following as a church and if this would be adjusted in favour of making vaccination mandatory, that was when this requirement would be considered. When Mngomezulu was further questioned on whether in his personal capacity as a pastor he thought making vaccination mandatory for the clergy would be beneficial, to not only the pastors, but the congregation because pastors’ duties entailed visiting the households of congregants for interventions or prayers and also counselling sessions which required them to see their congregants in person; the pastor said the current stance by the government of making vaccination optional was what he agreed with.

Safety

“For safety measures it would not be completely wrong to adhere to a directive of making vaccination mandatory, but for now I think making vaccination optional is the way to go,” said the man of the cloth. When Eswatini Conference of Churches Chief Executive Officer Themba Ngozo was asked to comment on the body’s stance on whether they would recommend calling for vaccination to be mandatory, he said for them, that would be overstepping as they maintained that COVID-19 vaccination should be an individual’s choice. He pointed out that there was still a need for extensive research surrounding COVID-19 vaccination and education on vaccines was lacking and most people were not accurately informed about taking the jab, so it was important for people to still be given the option to choose whether to vaccinate or not. “As an organisation, we encourage individual Christians to make their own decisions when it comes to vaccinating. It should be a personal choice as I also took the personal decision to vaccinate,” said Ngozo.

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