Let me grant that much of modern “science” is politically correct more than verifiably true. But with that said, to put vaccines in the same category as macro-evolution and global warming climate-change is to ignore basic evidence. Measles used to ravage the world, and now it has practically been eliminated because of a vaccine. To deny that is to…well, it is to deny science. With that said, here are four reasons Christians should vaccinate their children:

This week was vaccine week in the news. Measles outbreaks in California and Arizona shed light on the trend of anti-vaxxers: parents who intentionally do not have their kids immunized against measles (the actual vaccination is against measles, mumps, and rubella). Today I want to appeal to Christian parents who are in the anti-vaxx crowd. But before getting there, a little history:

Measles is a disease that spreads rapidly, largely decimated the Native American population in the United States, and brought global chaos  for centuries. It is not frequently lethal in healthy children who receive medical attention, but because of how painful it is and how quickly it spreads person-to-person, through much of the last 500 years it has been regarded as one of the most dangerous diseases.

But in the 1950’s a Navy pilot and war-hero-turned doctor was able to identify the virus that caused measles. This soon led to a vaccination, likely one of the most impressive feats of the modern world. Not only did the vaccination protect those who received it, but it soon became obvious that there was a societal affect as well. Doctors began to notice  “herd-immunity,” which basically means that when over 90% of the population is vaccinated, the disease stops spreading to the point that it dies out. In fact, in 2000 the US Centers for Disease Control declared that  measles had been effectively eliminated from the US.

One of the most devastating and feared diseases in the history of the world was defeated by a vaccine—a vaccine that not only protected those who received it, but protected those who were too weak to receive it (such as infants, or those with immune deficiency disorders).

But things didn’t stay that way. A 1998 study claimed that the vaccine that had vanquished the disease was also causing harmful side-effects, such as autism in children. The study was latershown to be a fraud, the doctor had his medical license revoked, and was essentially tarred-and-feathered. But with the onset of the internet age, the fraudulent study spread, and was believed by many who simply didn’t know it had been debunked.

Those who were influenced by the study latched on to two concepts—the concept of herd-immunity, and the concept that the vaccine might be dangerous—and a trend of anti-vaxxers was born. Some refuse to vaccinate their children because they read somewhere on-line that the vaccines are dangerous, and they believed what they read. Others refuse to vaccinate because of the, “hey, there is a controversy, these are my kids, so why risk it” attitude.

And while the consensus in the media is that most of that crowd is liberal, non-religious, Whole-foods-shopping, Prius-driving (and that may be true), I also know many Christians who have joined this crowd. Before I appeal to you to get out, let me quickly say that I get why the anti-vaxx argument appeals to Christians.

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