"Those who lead a life in conformity with the precepts of the Lord abstain from all the remedies which God has not destined for this end; even if they were assured of being cured by this means, they would not fail to abhor them as artifices and enchantments of the devil. These words are taken from the Catechism of the Council of Trent in its explanation of the seventh petition of the Dominical Prayer. They make us wonder, as well as the instinctive reaction of many Catholics, about this genetic information - improperly called vaccines - whose elaboration uses human cells from an aborted fetus. The fact is not disputed. Pamela Acker, in her successive interviews on Life Site News and in her book "Vaccination: a Catholic Perspective", provides us with very important docuмentation on the subject, which we will use for our study, which will be limited essentially to assessing the morality of accepting to be ναccιnαted when the vaccine uses HEK-293 cells in its manufacture2. We are grateful to her for sharing with us Alvin Wong's reflections in "The Ethics of HEK-293" and for giving us the opportunity to discover other American authors who have been communicating theological arguments on the subject for almost twenty years.

It must be recognized that Catholics in the United States, in conservative or traditional circles, are far ahead of us on this issue, and we would be remiss to ignore their thinking. In the present work, after having described the origin of the HEK-293 cell line (I), explained its relationship in the manufacture and production of CÖVÌD vaccines (II), we will seek to identify and enumerate the sins that are committed in the course of making vaccines (III) and we will then propose a moral reflection on the conductivity of sin (IV). Finally, we will try to estimate how far the consent to be ναccιnαted is from the sins committed (V).


On the origin of HEK-293 cells

"HEK" is the acronym for "human embryonic kidney". This is a proof that the origin of the cell line bearing this name is the kidney of a human embryo.

The number 293 tells us how many previous experiments were necessary to achieve the stable and almost immortal development of this cell line. "This does not mean that there were 293 abortions, but for 293 experiments, it takes much more than one abortion. We are probably talking about hundreds of abortions. "3 To give an order of magnitude, it is known that for the WI38 cell line also derived from an aborted fetus, 32 abortions were required.4 This proportion is roughly the same for several other lines. Based on this ratio, there would have been approximately 246 abortions prior to the aborted fetus in the Netherlands in 1972 from which the cell line HEK-293 was derived.

In his book The Ethics of HEK-293, Alvin Wong mentions an interview with Dr. Alex van der Eb who was involved in the development of this line and who specifies, as far as he remembers, that the fetus at the origin of this line was perfectly normal. The reasons for this abortion may have been known to him, but he does not recall them.5 This fetus was that of a girl.

Wong gives numerous and compelling reasons why it is extremely likely that the initial abortion of the HEK-293 line was not a miscarriage but an abortion. Most importantly, as Pamela Acker explains, researchers need to obtain the human tissue within five minutes of the abortion for it to be certainly usable.6 Collecting the kidney one hour after the fetus has died serves no purpose. It is clear that if the miscarriage was a miscarriage, there is very little chance of timely intervention. Only abortion allows the desired kidney to be extracted with great speed.

In this logic, we understand the researchers' wish that the babies be delivered by caesarean section. It is indeed when they are recovered alive that the chances of extracting the kidney under the best conditions are optimal. The kidney is therefore removed from a fetal body whose heart is often still beating. The removal of the organ normally takes place without anesthesia in order to avoid cell disruption. Mothers may also be pressured to delay the abortion date in order to harvest a better developed kidney.


On the use of HEK-293 cells in the manufacture of the CÖVÌD "vaccine "7.

To arrive at the vaccines marketed by the laboratories, three different uses of HEK-293 cells must be distinguished. The first occurs in the design and production phase of the vaccine. The second is in the phase of experimentation of its effectiveness and the third to allow the tests of effectiveness of the batches of vaccines before using them. Let's briefly explain what they consist of by differentiating between conventional vaccines and so-called messenger RNA vaccines for the design and production phases.

For viral vector-based vaccines, HEK-293 cells can be used at all stages of their development: for the design and production of the vaccine by transfection of these cells.

However, for the so-called messenger RNA vaccines, even though the nucleic acid is produced by biotechnology from the karyotype of the cσɾσnαvιɾυs, scientists have been forced to genetically create a more resistant Spike protein than the naturally occurring one. The experiments to obtain the desired mutations in the protein were initially carried out in HEK-293 cells. Thus, Pamela Hacker concludes, "the breakthrough protein encoded by the vaccines was originally developed in aborted fetal cells. "8

Before attempting to inject the vaccine into a human being, it was first tested in cell culture in the laboratory because it is much less expensive and dangerous than trying it on humans. It was then possible to verify that the artificially produced mRNA allowed for the controlled production of the protein. The same is true for conventional vaccines. However, these verifications were carried out on HEK-293 cells.

Finally, each time new batches are made - or most often - their efficacy is first verified on HEK-293 cells.

Let us conclude by saying that, even if the "vaccines" proposed by laboratories using HEK-293 cells do not theoretically contain remnants of these human cells, there is no certainty on this subject. Indeed, the purification of vaccines is generally carried out by centrifuge because this process is cheap. If one wanted a perfect guarantee of purity, one would have to use other expensive means.


Identification and enumeration of the sins committed to achieve the marketing of "vaccines".

We are now in a position to distinguish, enumerate and identify the successive sins committed in the past and present to get the vaccines on the market, and foreseeable in the future to feed the market:

Past sins:

Originally, abortions:

We have conjectured the plausible range of the number of abortions required to obtain the desired healthy kidney cells: between 240 and 250, and we have indicated the reasons why spontaneous abortions should be ruled out. If it is true that a single abortion is an abominable crime, the mass grave of babies that we discover at the origin of the HEK-293 cell line adds singularly to the horror and underlines the cynicism of the merchants of human flesh, regulars of the crime. Even if the abortions were not decided in order to obtain human cells, one can see that the procedure used was chosen with this intention.

-Vivisection on human beings:

For lack of a more appropriate word, we use the word here to designate dissections that are performed on living animals. However, they are performed on babies that have been torn from their mother's womb. One kidney or the other is removed, if possible while they are still alive, so that the tissue taken is of better quality. An anaesthetic is not even used beforehand to avoid the risk of disrupting the cells. This butchering of live babies is probably repeated about as many times as the abortions counted.

-Deprivation of both lives:

All these babies die without being baptized and go to limbo. Homicides not only deprive them of their earthly existence but also of the hope of the blessed life. At the same time they deprive God of all those who could have been his children by grace and his worshippers in Heaven. Whoever looks at things according to the Faith must recognize in this third sin the height of abomination.

-Theft and usurpation of organs:

The babies who were skinned obviously did not give their consent to have their kidneys ripped out of them to be used for science, research or industry. And, assuming that a mother agreed to have her baby delivered alive to the skinners, her consent, subsequent to the consent she gave for the murder of her child, is iniquitous, devoid of any value. Would it be acceptable that the practice of vivisection definitively excludes any legitimacy to the juicy recovery9 of these kidneys.

There is thus, at the origin, a criminal theft of human organs. It should be added here that there is not only theft but usurpation, because there is truly an appropriation by the takers of the rights to these organs.

The irrefutable sign of this usurpation lies in the reading of the DNA of any cell of the HEK-293 lineage. It would show in an infallible way that the DNA is that of a unique person, that of this embryo killed in 1972 in the Netherlands.

If it is true that man has only the usufruct of his body and that his usufruct is extinguished from his death until the Resurrection of the bodies, the remains of this body belong only to God and must be buried. Throughout the centuries, scavengers and skinners have been punished with death.

Present sins:

-Fencing and illegitimate exploitation of human cells:

Fencing is the unjust possession of what does not belong to us. The laboratories in possession of the HEK-293 cells are guilty of concealing human cells. Their activity with these cells remains illegitimate on the grounds of the initial criminal usurpation and no prescription can be accepted in such a matter. The triple use of these cells for the design, production and verification of the efficacy of the vaccine and the quality of the batches put on the market is therefore illegitimate.

-Cooperation in the industrialization of the human body:

Laboratories, heirs to criminal theft, usurpers of human organs, receivers and exploiters of these tissues, are obviously actors in the gigantic enterprise of commodification of the human body. Although they are actors, they are at the same time accomplices, formally accomplices of this terrifying multiform activity of instrumentalization of the bodies of the weakest human beings and thus in particular of those who are still intrauterine. If it is true that this complicity does not enter directly into the genealogy of the sins that separate the initial abortions from the proposed vaccines, it is nevertheless required to take it into account.

-Injection of a vaccine containing human debris:

The laboratories, cannot guarantee that the vaccines do not contain any debris of human cells. There is therefore a risk of injecting DNA fragments, even if they are only present in infinitesimal quantities. In the end, it is a question of directly exploiting something of the aborted fetus in the vaccine. This time, it is no longer simply the instrumentalization of the human body in the service of the manufacture of the vaccine, but the injection of human fragments recovered following a murder. It is easy to understand that this is a new level of seriousness. It is easy to understand that this is a new level of seriousness, but let us not retort that human debris is found in infinitesimal quantities, because the smallest strand of DNA is enough to characterize human nature.

Sins to come:

-Encouraging the vicious circle of creating new fetal cell lines:

Although they are called immortal, cell lines are not really immortal. They don't last forever, and obviously, when they run out, laboratories will need to create more. So the history of the same sins that have been committed begins again and will always begin again until the protest is heard.


General reflections on the conductivity of moral evil:

Our goal now is to investigate the morality of consent to receive a vaccine that has been made with HEK-293 cells. Suppose that there is no difficulty in receiving this vaccine (which is not true) other than the history of sins we have just given, the question is whether it would be legitimate to be ναccιnαted. Can't we say that these sins belong to the past, that we must certainly deplore them, but that the damage is done and that receiving the vaccine or not will not change anything?

Using an easy-to-understand example, let us show that just because a sin occurred in the past, without our having had any part in it, does not mean that we cannot be morally contaminated by it. Let's say a man has committed a theft of a million euros. He dies. His son - aware of his father's theft - inherits and does not return the stolen sum. He dies in turn and his son inherits, aware of his grandfather's theft... I am a friend of this grandson who offers me a car from this money while warning me of its stolen origin. Do I have the right to receive the car? No. If I accepted it, I would be committing theft myself. We can see that there is a conductivity of past sins that can have a strong impact on the morality of present sins. By certain acts that we perform, there is a kind of appropriation of the previous acts of others, whose morality is redundant on ours.

It may be enough to approve them for them to resound in us. But their resonance becomes even more penetrating when we enter into the enjoyment that the fructification of these past acts gives us. If they are sins, their appropriation is likely to take place in a very profound way.

Nevertheless, it seems to us that it is wrong to speak of cooperation with evil when we want to speak of the connection that is established between an act of the present and an act of the past. Indeed, the notion of cooperation supposes the exercise of a causality, of a real influence on a sin. Therefore, it should only be used in the case of a present or future sin.

In spite of this difference between past acts on the one hand and present and future acts on the other, it must be recognized that the distinctions which allow us to identify the nature of cooperation and its licitness are also useful in analyzing the question of the right to enjoy the fruits of sin.

We recall, then, that cooperation in sin is never possible if it is formal, that is, if the cooperator has adopted the evil intention of the actor of the sin. It is also forbidden if it is immediate. By immediacy is meant cooperation in the very act of sin. This immediate cooperation is forbidden, of course, if it is a formal cooperation, but even if it is only material, i.e., without participation in the intention of the principal agent, for the action in which the cooperator participates would be a sin. There remains the case of mediate cooperation, where one contributes indirectly to the sin without entering into the intention of the one who commits it. Ordinarily unlawful, distant material and mediate cooperation can sometimes be lawful for proportionately serious reasons.

But how do we know that these proportionally serious motives exist and are sufficient to admit remote mediate cooperation? The prudential judgment that one must make is delicate, complex. All the circuмstances must be taken into account and the following criteria analyzed.

-The motive must be all the more serious :

-the more serious the sin in which one cooperates,

-that the act by which one cooperates will provoke the scandal of the weak,

-that the act by which one cooperates comes closer to sin,

-that the sin we cooperate in would be avoided without our cooperation,

-that the obligation to prevent this sin is greater because of the nature of things, the circuмstances, the personal situation of the cooperator.

It may be noted that two of these criteria (the avoidance of the sin without our cooperation and the obligation to prevent it) are only relevant in the case of cooperation. In the case where it is a question of knowing whether we can enjoy the fruitfulness of sin, these criteria no longer come into play since the sins have already taken place.

Finally, we must draw attention to the notion of scandal. We must call scandalous "any fact, omission, word, or action that has at least one aspect that is less good and that can produce a moral fault in another person. If this one does not fall, the scandalous fact will at least be the occasion of a painful and reproving astonishment. Therefore, every scandal that is willed or permitted without proportionate reason is, by its nature, a more or less serious fault against Christian charity. "10

If one should not take into account the pharisaical scandal which is provoked in others because of their bad personal dispositions, one should be concerned not to scandalize the weak who, because of their ignorance, are scandalized by actions which are nevertheless legitimate. It is for this reason that St. Paul, while forbidding that meats which have been consecrated to idols could be eaten without scruples, concludes that if this eating were to scandalize the weak, then it would be necessary to abstain from it.11

Another example, very enlightening, is found in the life of Saint Pascal Baylon, a Franciscan lay brother of the 16th century. When he was the porter of his convent and had come to warn his superior that he was needed, the latter asked him to tell his solicitors that he was not there. We know that this answer is a so-called conventional word which must be understood in the sense that the one who is asked is not available. But the saint, after having tried to obtain another answer, coming up against his superior, ends up saying to him: "Father, that would be a lie and therefore a sin, and sin is offence to God. "12 And for the only time in his life, he does not obey. It must be added to this anecdote that, although the humble Brother Lai had not studied, God had given him such a great infused knowledge that the greatest theologians of the time came to consult him and were amazed at the extent and depth of his knowledge! This - it must be admitted - does not argue too much in favor of mental restrictions.


Estimating the existence of a proportionate reason for receiving this HEK-293 vaccine

Of the sins we have listed, almost all are past sins. We have explained how these sins can, however, contaminate us even if we have not cooperated in their fulfillment. One of them, however, is a sin that is still current: it is the receiving of human cells that were originally criminally stolen. The same applies to the illegitimate exploitation of these cells, and in particular, in the case of the CÖVÌD vaccine, to the use of these cells in production design and quality testing when new batches of vaccine are released, as well as during vaccination. As we have written, two of the five criteria for assessing whether there are proportionate grounds for mediated material cooperation become meaningless if they relate to past sins. We will therefore consider these two criteria only for sins that are still present. Let us therefore review the five criteria.

1st criterion of judgment: Gravity of the sins with which we are connected, either those that have been committed or those that continue to be committed.

The first criterion to consider is the seriousness of the sins with which one cooperates, if they are present or future sins, or from which one benefits, if they are past sins. And we understand that the greater the gravity of the sins, the more difficult it is to cooperate or to obtain any fruit from them. Indeed, the connection that is established with them, sets up a kind of guarantee, of complicity which is all the more problematic as the sin is serious. It is obvious that the seriousness of the sins with which the one who decides to receive this kind of vaccine is connected is extreme. One can think of a nuclear explosion whose irradiation is such that even those who are very far from the epicenter suffer the effects. To put the question differently: even if it is a question of preserving the greatest goods such as health or life, is it legitimate to accept even a slight complicity with such sins?

Although this criterion alone does not, it seems to us, allow us to answer this question yet, it is sufficient, on the other hand, to show already how morally perilous the acceptance of this vaccine is.

2nd criterion of judgment: Evaluation of the scandal caused by the acceptance of the vaccine

We put aside the pharisaical scandal, which seems to us to be absent from the reactions we are witnessing. Two very different reactions are manifested when we learn that ecclesiastical authorities consider the vaccine possible, on proportionate grounds. The first is incomprehension, revolt, indignation against the admission of a collusion that scandalizes them. The reasoning does not pass. The fact that the Vatican declared itself in favor of the possibility of using these vaccines is today considered, by a notable fringe of Catholics, as an additional sign that it should not be used, so immense is the discredit of conciliar Rome and not only in traditionalist circles.

Mutatis mutandis, one thinks of the reaction of St. Pascal Baylon... This reaction is already accredited by the positions taken in favor of the intransigent line. Let us add that it is often also motivated by other aspects, medical and/or political, which we do not address in this article.

In the opposite direction, the second reaction is a sigh of relief. One can, in all conscience, receive the vaccine. This removes the spectre of many of the anxieties and difficult tomorrows that were foreseen... Was there a scandalous effect in those who reacted in this way? One senses in them the fear that morality would one day impose on them something that would make their civic integration very difficult, if not impossible, but doesn't their will to always find arrangements end up prevailing over moral judgment? There is a submission to ever more constraining diktats that leads men, and Catholics in particular, to have to accept ever greater complicities and to move away from the line of "non possumus".

Even if one were to conclude that this vaccine is possible, should one not add, as St. Paul did with regard to idolothytes, that it is better to abstain from it so as not to hurt the conscience of those whom one has deemed to be weak? This would be a first reason. But is there not a greater reason, one which is for the common good, and which is that the worsening of cooperation weakens us more and more and makes us less and less able to oppose the Catholic principle against barbarism?

We do not yet rule the debate here, even if we think that the consideration of the scandalous effect is crucial.

The third criterion of judgment: the evaluation of the proximity of the consent to the vaccine to the sins listed.

As we have said, three sins are present: the receipt of human cells without and against the consent of the usufructuary, the exploitation of these cells, especially in the design, production and quality testing of the CÖVÌD vaccine, and the vaccination itself, given the presence of human debris in the vaccine.

Perhaps more tellingly, let's imagine a company that is known to operate on a serious initial theft of materials from which all the products it sells are made. It seems to us that these products could only be purchased for very serious reasons and to the extent that there is no other possibility.

We find ourselves in a similar situation with these laboratories, with one terribly aggravating circuмstance for them. It is obviously that their theft, their initial usurpation, their present exploitation is not of materials but of human cells coming from a dissected living child.

The consent to the vaccine would place us not only in connection with a theft but with a crime. But at what distance? Considering the initial abortions and vivisection, let us count for nothing the distance in time, in space and incognito of the child. Whether it is a child aborted in 1972 in Amsterdam or a little girl aborted an hour ago in Paris and whose name is known, does not change the question at all. The notion of moral distance does not have to deal with these factors. The moral distance that exists is that the person who is ναccιnαted is indeed far from the initial act from which he benefits in a mediate and distant way.

On the other hand, the distance from the sin is much less if we consider the criminal concealment and exploitation of cells. It is from this criminal laboratory, illegitimate exploiter of human cells, that the said vaccine was produced. If it were only a matter of vulgar stolen materials, there could be proportionally serious reasons for buying them, but none of them could be found that would not be sufficient to legitimize the not-so-distant - and even less distant - connection with the crimes of concealment and exploitation.

But now we must ask ourselves if the acceptance of receiving a vaccine that contains DNA fragments does not constitute a material but immediate cooperation with that "unspeakable" sin that consists in accepting that man becomes a "consumer" of elements of the human body derived from crime.

4th and 5th criteria: hope of avoiding the sin if one does not enter into connection with it and more or less strict duty to prevent it.

We group together these last two criteria which make us feel more strictly than the others how sin has invaded the world since we have to confess and that the individual refusal to receive the vaccine will not prevent the laboratories from continuing to develop their immoral activity and we feel quite powerless to oppose it.

However, this realization should not lead us to the perverse reasoning that it is useless to oppose it and to suffer all the damage that may result from it. Each one of us must act according to his conscience formed according to the divine law and not commit what is evil, even if he is the only one in the world to oppose it.

On the other hand, the heroic example that it would give, has in reality an incomparable exemplary scope as the history of heroes and saints shows. Finally, let us say that we will not break down the walls of this Jericho of evil by the utopia of numbers but by the strength of God and our readiness to be his docile instruments in this struggle.

In this realistic because supernatural light, it becomes clear that a courageous refusal is already shaking the system and helping to weaken the Goliath of iniquity that challenges the Catholic world.

In this article we have not discussed the medical or political aspects of vaccination, which also deserve moral attention. As for the medical aspect, we must remember that man, being only the usufructuary of his body, must not resign himself to being used as a guinea pig by science. Distinguished and courageous voices such as that of Mrs. Alexandra Henrion-Caude, and many others, warn us of the potentially serious consequences of these new gene therapies that are not under control.

The names of the most illustrious virologists appear to warn us of the genetic modifications that will result from mRNA vaccines. At the risk of surprising, we do not hesitate to write that this manipulation of the genetic heritage constitutes a moral reason to oppose the vaccine, even more serious than that of the use of human cells from sacrificed children.

Finally, it is not difficult to see that the most determined supporters of this compulsory vaccination, among those who hold financial and political power, are very often at the same time the militants of a humanity reset to zero and of a forced depopulation.

Moral reflection on these medical and political aspects of vaccination could only reinforce our moral conclusion about HEK-293. However, in this time of misuse of ecclesiastical authorities, we are well aware that we can only deliver an opinion. It is only as good as the arguments we have given. Other voices have concluded differently. May this article make its modest contribution to the fundamental debate that the seriousness of the question deserves.

1 Lev. 20; 2-3.

2 Among the laboratories that use these HEK 293 cells, once or several times in the making of vaccines and before their commercialization, we can mention Astrazeneca, Sputnik V, Novavax, mσdernα, pfιzєr.

3 Pamela Acker in an interview conducted by John-Henry Westen of Life Site News and translated by Jeanne Smit, on her blog on 23 January 2021.

4 Ibid.

5 Alvin Wong in The Ethics of HEK-293, The National Catholic Bioethics Quarterly, 2006, p. 274.

6 Pamela Acker, ibidem.

7 As pointed out by several scientific authorities, and in particular by Dr. Alexandra Henrion-Caude, the word "vaccine" is actually inadequate. We should rather speak of "genetic information". We use the word "vaccine" for convenience.

8 Pamela Acker, ibidem.

9 Available over the counter on the ATCC website, you can add 10 µg of HEK-293 to your shopping cart at the price of 439 €.

10 J.M.Vittrant, Théologie Morale, Beauchesne 1954, n° 150, p.97.

11 I, Cor. VIII.

12 Father Louis Antoine de Porrentavy, Saint Pascal Baylon, Plon 1899, p.142.

Br. Joseph humbly demolishes the published arguments of the CDF and the SSPX. Consuming vaccines derived from aborted babies is an abomination.

I agree.

And in my opinion, consuming the COVID vaccine in particular -- which is clearly neither necessary, nor effective, nor safe -- is almost as bad an abomination.

It involves enthroning the father of lies on the altar of truth. Trusting liars instead of truth-tellers. Taking the COVID hoax at face value, when it's clearly a communist, godless agenda at work.

Insofar as COVID even EXISTS, it's completely treatable. Nothing to fear; no need for any vaccine. Just get treated, like you would for any other completely treatable illness!