Meditation 1120
An Epidemic of Infectious Ignorance
by: John Tyrrell
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Currently, there are several local measles epidemics in North America. Measles once considered almost wiped out on this continent has returned thanks largely to the anti-vaccination hysteria created by the proven fraud, Andrew Wakefield and promulgated by incredibly ignorant celebrities, wilfully blind to the fact that Wakefield has been shown to be a self-promoting liar who published dishonest research to try to make money.
But the measles epidemic closest to where I live does not appear to have arisen out of the Wakefield - McCarthy fed anti-vaccination movement (though it has contributed to the spread of the disease), but rather out of religious ignorance.
Rev. Adriaan Geuze, spiritual leader of the Reformed Congregation of North America in Chilliwack, British Columbia sees vaccines as an interference with God’s providential care.
“We leave it in (God’s) hands. If it is in his will that somehow we get a contagious disease, like in this case the measles, there are other ways, of course, to avoid this.”
Of course, he can point to Jesus's own words as quoted in Matthew 9:12 as authority for this opinion.
Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick do.
This line of thinking has led to over 300 sick children - sick because ignorant fools use religion as an excuse to leave things in God's hand rather than take advantage of preventative medicine. Ignorant fools who rant about the rights of the unborn, but who place a greater importance on a literal interpretation of an ancient error-filled text than upon the lives of their own living breathing children.
Let us suppose that Jesus really existed, and that the above words attributed to him are a perfectly accurate representation of what Jesus said. But - put those words into context - the context of 30AD. It is key that those words would have been uttered almost 2,000 years ago when the was no such thing as preventative medicine. And physicians of the day had no real understanding of disease. Treatments they administered were as likely to kill as to cure. Knowing that, a healthier person would not go to a physician. Only those already risking death from illness would add the risk of death from medicine in the hope of a cure. Jesus's advice was very appropriate — for 30AD.
BUT — it is no longer 30 AD. A twenty-first century physician is entirely different than a first century physician. And Jesus was not talking about twenty-first century physicians or twenty-first century medicine. He was talking about his own time.
We can hope that in time the truth about Wakefield will sink into the consciousness of his deluded followers — or at least, they'll eventually all die off — and that element of the anti-vaccination movement may disappear. Unfortunately, those who base their opposition to vaccination on a never-ending series of bible punching idiots' interpretations of God's will seem to be likely to remain with us for eternity.
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