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Religion and Public Health during the Time of COVID-19

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A special issue of Religions (ISSN 2077-1444). This special issue belongs to the section "Religions and Health/Psychology/Social Sciences".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (7 May 2023) | Viewed by 18527

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Special Issue Editors

Prof. Dr. Andrew Flescher

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Guest Editor

Department of Family, Population and Preventive Medicine, Core Faculty in Public Health and Department of English, State University of New York, Stony Brook, NY 11794-8338, USA
Interests: biomedical ethics; ethics and health care policy; ethics of organ donation; medical humanities; compassion and altruism; health care justice; normative ethics; moral theory; comparative religious ethics; applied ethics; methods and theory of religion; philosophy of religion; religion and culture; arts, religion and literature; religion and film; hermeneutics

Prof. Dr. Joel Zimbelman

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor

Emeritus Professor, Department of Comparative Religion and Humanities, California State University, Chico, CA 95929-0740, USA
Interests: religious and applied social ethics; religious and intellectual development of the West

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Many dimensions of the recent COVID-19 pandemic and its amelioration have been well discussed in the literature—basic and applied scientific research, public health and public policy challenges, legal issues, the psycho-social dimensions of ongoing health risk and the treatment of the ill and dying, financial issues, fiscal policy, and national security issues. To date, however, there has been scant attention given to the thorny moral issues presented by COVID-19 in connection with the religious beliefs, mores, history, practices, and communal identity in assessing and evaluating responses to the pandemic. Our goal in this Special Issue of Religions is to address this gap in the literature, and to reveal how important—indeed, definitive—such beliefs and practices are (and should be) to stakeholders and policy makers, and to those afflicted by this pandemic. To this end, we propose to explore the ways in which such beliefs inform the analysis of these many dimensions of COVID-19, mentioned above.

Proposed Timelines/Deadlines:

February 2022—Call for invitations goes out, with deadline of May 1st, 2022 for authors to indicate their interest in submitting an article for the special issue.
First week May 2022—Co-Editors select authors for the special issue and inform them.
Final deadline for submission of articles—November 30th, 2022.
December, 2022, Co-editors review submissions as well as send out submissions to reviewers for feedback.
January 31st, 2023—Deadline for feedback from reviewers to authors.
March 31st, 2023—Deadline for authors to attend to requests for revision and resubmit.
April–June 2023—Editors review re-submissions.
July 2023—Editorial office edits submissions and Publication appears on line.

Summary:

Aim

In this Special Issue we solicit articles which deal with a wide range of topics probing the interface between religion and the current pandemic through which we are living. We are seeking the treatment of a broad range of topics exploring areas in which religious issues bear on the lived experience and moral and public health implications of COVID-19.

Scope

Topics may include, but will not be limited to, treatments of religious freedom and the argument from autonomy; religious exemptions to vaccination requirements; social justice and the claims of the other (with regard to mitigation measures, vaccines, and public health policy); nationalism versus globalism in the context of pandemics generally; religions and their resources as a way of morally imagining solutions to crises precipitated by the COVID-19 pandemic; religion, culture, and vaccine hesitancy and responses to vaccinate hesitancy that engage culturally sensitive messaging; religion and public health policy in the context of pandemics; COVID-19, religion, and the political zeitgeist; religion traditions and pandemic narratives.

Prof. Dr. Andrew Flescher
Prof. Dr. Joel Zimbelman
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a double-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Religions is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 1800 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

autonomy
religious freedom
religious exemptions
vaccine mandates
nationalism
globalism
religions and moral imagination
pandemic narratives
social justice and access to care
other-regard

Published Papers (11 papers)

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Editorial

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9 pages, 243 KiB

Open AccessEditorial

Looking at the Impact of COVID-19 on Religious Practice and the Impact of Religious Practice on COVID-19

by Joel Zimbelman and Andrew Flescher

Religions 2023, 14(7), 933; https://doi.org/10.3390/rel14070933 - 19 Jul 2023

Viewed by 952

Abstract

As this collection of essays on the manner in which religion and public health policy have impacted one another in the COVID-19 era goes to press, both the United States’ Centers for Disease Control (CDC) and the United Nations’ World Health Organization (WHO) [...] Read more.

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Religion and Public Health during the Time of COVID-19)

Research

Jump to: Editorial

14 pages, 245 KiB

Open AccessArticle

The Arbitrariness of Faith-Based Medical Exemptions

by Aaron Quinn

Religions 2023, 14(7), 934; https://doi.org/10.3390/rel14070934 - 19 Jul 2023

Viewed by 741

Abstract

There are a variety of reasons for which one might claim an exemption from a public health mandate such as a required COVID-19 vaccine. Good-faith exemption requests—for medical, religious, or other reasons—are generally recognized as legitimate and granted to individuals when the imposition of the mandate on the requestor is perceived to outweigh the corresponding risk their lack of vaccination poses to the health and rights of others. This paper develops a method of analysis rooted in Western analytic philosophy designed to examine these issues and arrive at a framework for assessing the scientific, moral, and religious claims for exemptions from COVID-19 vaccinations. I argue that some empirical and moral beliefs are epistemically superior to others when they have a correspondence with agreed-upon facts about the world, are grounded in shared human experience, employ strong and substantive reasons for their claims, and embrace common convictions evidenced in the character of moral agents. Such facts must be demonstrable in the form of observably verifiable evidence and reliable testimony. Only then should a request for an exemption to an otherwise-required public health mandate (including a vaccine) be recognized. The alternative creates various difficulties, including the problem of moral arbitrariness. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Religion and Public Health during the Time of COVID-19)

15 pages, 792 KiB

Open AccessArticle

COVID-19, State Intervention, and Confucian Paternalism

by Ellen Y. Zhang

Religions 2023, 14(6), 776; https://doi.org/10.3390/rel14060776 - 12 Jun 2023

Viewed by 1180

Abstract

For many in the West, paternalism manifest as state interference carries a pejorative connotation, as it is often taken to entail unjustified restrictions on autonomy and self-determination and frequently believed to precipitate bureaucracy, corruption, and inefficiency. Meanwhile, uncritical deference to policies in which individual liberties remain essentially unchecked by state oversight has faced renewed scrutiny since the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, as many across the globe are now coming to believe that we must accept greater governmental intervention in our lives, particularly during times of widespread health crises. This paper explores normative considerations justifying state intervention with respect to public health policies in response to the COVID-19 pandemic through the lens of Confucian paternalism, which is distinguished from a more general concept of paternalism widely used in contemporary philosophical discourse. It argues that the “soft” paternalism apropos to Confucianism has pragmatic benefits for the development of healthcare policies due to which it is not only morally warranted but even preferable to alternatives in terms of safeguarding population health. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Religion and Public Health during the Time of COVID-19)

16 pages, 288 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Between Tyranny and Anarchy: Islam, COVID-19, and Public Policy

by Mahan Mirza

Religions 2023, 14(6), 737; https://doi.org/10.3390/rel14060737 - 02 Jun 2023

Viewed by 1931

Abstract

Research on the causes for vaccine resistance among Nigerian Muslims reveals what the philosopher Žižek terms a “heaven in disorder:” lack of trust in public institutions, conspiracy theories, ignorance of basic science, individual apathy, and faith in “Allah as the only protector.” Other social contexts demonstrate far greater compliance. How can governments improve outcomes in vaccine resistant communities amidst such complexity, especially in instances where theology provides a right to dissent? Alongside a right to dissent, “obedience to authority” for the sake of social and political harmony is also an important principle of Islamic thought. It has the ability to enhance widespread compliance to public health guidelines by obligating the setting aside of private convictions in favor of collective cooperation. Religious literacy is an important element for responding effectively to pandemics, and by extension, other global emergencies. While policymakers must tailor their outreach to incommensurable worldviews in society, the human family must also imagine effective political models for cooperation despite divergence in worldviews. Otherwise, societies may need to choose between tyranny and anarchy. This article adds to efforts already underway which aim to demonstrate that engagement with religious norms, rather than their dismissal, represents the most promising path towards tackling vaccine resistance, especially in communities in which religious authority significantly informs social practice. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Religion and Public Health during the Time of COVID-19)

17 pages, 370 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Holy Communion in Greek Orthodoxy in the Time of Coronavirus: Ideological Perspectives in Conflict

by Efstathios Kessareas

Religions 2023, 14(5), 647; https://doi.org/10.3390/rel14050647 - 12 May 2023

Cited by 1 | Viewed by 1313

Abstract

This article examines the controversy over the mode of distribution of Holy Communion that surfaced during the COVID-19 pandemic, with a focus on debates that took place in the Greek Orthodox community. After describing and evaluating the role of secular and religious experts in the context of the pandemic, the paper analyzes three main perspectives on the issue of the Eucharist: (1) the secularist-rationalist viewpoint; (2) the religious–traditionalist outlook; and (3) the “Third Way” perspective. The paper argues that the Church’s Holy Communion controversy is indicative of a deeper struggle between religious and secular thinkers and among various voices in the Greek Orthodox Church concerning the latter’s place in, and influence over, the modern secular socio-political order. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Religion and Public Health during the Time of COVID-19)

17 pages, 325 KiB

Open AccessArticle

COVID-19 and the View from Africa

by Tim Davies, Kenneth Matengu and Judith E. Hall

Religions 2023, 14(5), 589; https://doi.org/10.3390/rel14050589 - 29 Apr 2023

Viewed by 1533

Abstract

In Africa, refusal of COVID-19 and other vaccines is widespread for different reasons, including disbelief in the existence of the virus itself and faith in traditional remedies. In sub-Saharan countries, refusal is often made worse by opposition to vaccines by the religious establishments. This is a pressing problem, as Africa has the highest vaccine-avoidable mortality rate for children under the age of five in the world. Dialogue between those wishing to promote vaccines and those who resist them is essential if the situation is to be improved. This article argues that Western and other aid agencies seeking to promote vaccination programs need to develop a dialogue with resisters, and in this process to embrace and commend the ancient African philosophical tradition of Ubuntu, incorporating it into these programs as a way to overcome such entrenched resistance. The paper concludes with concrete recommendations for how to accomplish this goal. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Religion and Public Health during the Time of COVID-19)

16 pages, 263 KiB

Open AccessArticle

How Well Do Religious Exemptions Apply to Mandates for COVID-19 Vaccines?

by Andrew Flescher

Religions 2023, 14(5), 569; https://doi.org/10.3390/rel14050569 - 24 Apr 2023

Viewed by 1511

Abstract

In the United States, religious exemptions to health-driven mandates enjoy, and should enjoy, protected status in medical ethics and healthcare law. Religious exemptions are defined as seriously professed exceptions to state or federal laws, which appeal to Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, allowing workers to request an exception to a job requirement, including a health-protective mandate, if it “conflicts with their sincerely held religious beliefs, practices, or observances”. In medical ethics, such religious exceptions are usually justified on the basis of the principle of autonomy, where personally held convictions, reflected in scripture or established religious norms, are safeguarded on the basis of the first amendment, thereby constituting an important area in which societal good must yield to individual liberty. Acknowledging the longstanding category of “religious exemptions”, and referencing some examples that adhere to its parameters in good faith (e.g., objections made by some institutions to HPV vaccines), I argue that, to date, no coherent basis for religious exemptions to COVID-19 vaccines has been offered through appeal to the principle of autonomy, or, in a healthcare context, to “medical freedom”. Indeed, proponents of characterizing these exemptions as legitimate misconstrue autonomy and abuse the reputation of the religious traditions they invoke in defense of their endeavors to opt out. The upshot is not only an error in interpreting the principle of autonomy, whereby it is issued a “blank check”, but also a dishonesty in itself whereby a contested political position becomes deliberately disguised as a protected religious value. “Sincerely held beliefs”, I conclude, appear no longer to constitute the standard for religious accommodation in the era of COVID-19. Individual declaration, seemingly free of any reasonable constraint, does. This is a shift that has serious consequences for public health and, more broadly, the public good. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Religion and Public Health during the Time of COVID-19)

18 pages, 335 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Exploring the Benefits of Yoga for Mental and Physical Health during the COVID-19 Pandemic

by Radhika Patel and Daniel Veidlinger

Religions 2023, 14(4), 538; https://doi.org/10.3390/rel14040538 - 17 Apr 2023

Cited by 2 | Viewed by 3025

Abstract

This article examines the efficacy of the postures, breath control techniques, and meditative states of yoga, specifically Haṭha Yoga, in promoting overall mental and physical health. It then examines whether this form of yoga could be effective in reducing morbidity or serious illness during the COVID-19 pandemic. We assess the potential efficacy of three claims made for Haṭha Yoga. They are the following: (1) breathing exercises associated with yoga may help maintain pulmonary health and protect the upper respiratory tract, the portal of entry for the SARS-CoV-2 virus infection; (2) improved immunity resulting from sustained yoga practice may help prevent COVID-19 contraction; (3) stress reduction of yoga may be effective in maintaining the mental well-being needed to combat the extra stress of living during a pandemic. Related to this claim, we examine testimony to the effect that yoga also gave people meaning and purpose in their lives during the isolating lockdown period. While exploring these beneficent advantages, we further address a serious health-related counterclaim that the community practice of yoga has the potential to create conditions that facilitate disease transmission due to heavy breathing in small, enclosed spaces. This balanced analysis introduces an interesting tension relevant to public health policy, namely that well-intended attempts to minimize indoor interaction for the sake of reducing the spread of infection may impact the effectiveness of yogic therapies and impede the freedom to practice the spiritual discipline of yoga. They may also not reduce the spread of infection enough to warrant their damaging effects on yoga practice. We suggest ways for resolving this tension and conclude with some concrete recommendations for facilitating yoga practice in future pandemics. These include (1) that public health policymakers consider programs that provide access to yoga by ensuring hospital prayer rooms appropriate in size and that, where feasible, yoga studios conduct their lessons outside in open areas; (2) that resources be devoted to providing therapeutic access to virtual yoga as a federal program, despite potential resistance to this idea of government involvement due to concerns that yoga has its origins in heterodox religious practice. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Religion and Public Health during the Time of COVID-19)

12 pages, 226 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Fostering the Global Common Good: The Relevance of Catholic Social Teaching to Public Health Debates

by Andrew Lustig

Religions 2023, 14(4), 504; https://doi.org/10.3390/rel14040504 - 06 Apr 2023

Viewed by 1586

Abstract

Given the scope and intensity of its impact, the COVID-19 pandemic proves instructive as an example of the shortfall in regnant legal and policy approaches to global health issues. Secular discussions of such issues tend to rely on a perspective best described as “policy realism”, with current international arrangements and institutions viewed as the acceptable context for future reform. Much of recent Catholic social teaching (hereinafter, CST) has challenged such realism in fundamental ways. While CST is often dismissed as merely prophetic in its tone, I defend its salience by assessing several aspects of its distinctive perspective: (1) the broad theological and anthropological vision reflected in the Catholic framework of basic norms, especially the norm of solidarity; (2) issues that arise in identifying different modes of moral discourse in modern CST; and (3) an effort to resolve such apparent tensions that unifies a distinctively Catholic approach to global health even as it suggests a series of “talking points” between the Catholic theological vision and various secular philosophical and political perspectives. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Religion and Public Health during the Time of COVID-19)

17 pages, 290 KiB

Open AccessArticle

COVID-19 and Religion

by Donald Heinz

Religions 2023, 14(4), 478; https://doi.org/10.3390/rel14040478 - 03 Apr 2023

Viewed by 1573

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic has produced a social drama in which churches, government, and individual actors have played prominent roles. While neo-conservative evangelicals have resisted governmental and scientific overreach in the name of “faith over fear”, liberal religious groups have joined in government and medical efforts for the good of the commons, offered comfort and assurance to those suffering, and called for support of the poor at home and abroad. Religions have turned right and left, from apocalyptic “resets” of global order to new calls for social justice. In this context, the root metaphor of the epidemic has been called up as a historical construct that helps to conceptualize, analyze, and act upon the COVID-19 crisis. Searching the past helps us see that not everything about COVID-19 as a social drama is a new or unheard-of challenge. For example, there are new evocations of the black death of 14th-century Europe that became a crisis in the church, as well as the great Lisbon earthquake in 1755, which upended the confidence of the European Enlightenment. Another way to appraise the dimensions of the COVID-19 outbreak is to call on the varied approaches characteristic of the sociology of religion, that is, to consider how ideology and belief are socially constructed in order to account for new intellectual responses to societal challenges. Does religion always produce the “collective effervescence” Durkheim posited? Does religious change always arrive downstream of cultural change, or can it also become an independent variable? This article attends primarily to the sharp responses of conservative religious expression in the face of attention-getting upheaval, which has readily translated into right-wing political action and electioneering. But the social uplift and altruism of liberal religion is not neglected either. Thus, this article provides an account of how science and governmental action have both been challenged and embraced in response to COVID-19. As such, it is not an empirical study stemming from new Pew-like social polling. Rather, it is a wide overview rooted in sociological methods and theory for tracking religion historically and presently in America in a manner that aims to inform a discussion of how COVID-19 has impacted religion and religious expression, and vice versa. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Religion and Public Health during the Time of COVID-19)

15 pages, 262 KiB

Open AccessArticle

In God We Trust: Community and Immunity in American Religions during COVID-19

by Julia Brown

Religions 2023, 14(3), 428; https://doi.org/10.3390/rel14030428 - 22 Mar 2023

Viewed by 1532

Abstract

From the systemic issues of race and class division to political partisanship and religious identity, the pandemic has affected many aspects of American social and political life. I interrogate the role that religions have played in communal identity-making during the pandemic, and how such identities shaped ideological responses, particularly in the US, stymying public health efforts to stop, or at least significantly slow, the spread of COVID-19. Drawing from Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s Love in the Time of Cholera as a historical case study, I use Garcia Marquez’s depiction of religion’s identity-making power during the cholera pandemic depicted in the novel as a comparison by which to understand current experiences of white Evangelical Christians in America during the current COVID-19 pandemic, particularly those who reject risk-minimizing practices such as mask wearing, quarantining, and vaccination. Drawing both from representations of Roberto Esposito’s theory of immunity and community, and from Lauren Berlant’s concept of “cruel optimism”, as well as sociological understandings of religion and identity, I argue that the boundary-making practices of religion and of communal and national identity are related to the complex and often contradictory set of moral practices that led many white Evangelicals to disregard public health policies surrounding COVID-19. A concurrent analysis of Garcia Marquez’s novel and of current events will allow me to explore this phenomenon, as Lauren Berlant would put it, both through the historically affective aesthetic and through the affective present. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Religion and Public Health during the Time of COVID-19)

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