HARARE, Zimbabwe (LifeSiteNews) — Zimbabwe has barred Christians who have not taken COVID jabs from church worship despite a High Court ruling suspending the ban.
Only 19% of the majority-Christian country has had even one COVID-19 shot.
On September 14, Monica Mustvangwa, the Minister of Information, told the public on behalf of the government that it will be ignoring the September 10 High Court ruling that the state must stop asking citizens for documents proving they’ve had the COVID jabs to attend church.
“Whilst all other gatherings shall not exceed 100 persons, with regards to churches, Cabinet has resolved [against the High Court ruling] that only vaccinated congregants can attend and should be limited to 50% of the holding capacity of the Church,” Mustvangwa said during a post-Cabinet press briefing.
Mustvangwa announced the initial ban on the “unvaccinated” in August, and her recent statement came out only four days after the High Court suspended the measure.
Justice David Mangota’s September 10 order overruling the ban stated: “The statement issued by the 1st respondent [Minister of Information Monica Mustvangwa] on behalf of the Cabinet barring unvaccinated sit-in congregants in Churches [is] suspended pending the return date of this application.”
“Further […] the conduct of the 2nd respondent [Minister of Home Affairs Kazembe Kazembe] in enforcing the statement by Cabinet and conducting arrests and criminal proceedings against unvaccinated sit-in church congregants [is] suspended pending the return date of this application,” the judge added.
Instead of retracting the government policy as required by the court, Mustvangwa and the rest of the Cabinet immediately announced they were doubling down on enforcing the measure. This has caused grave concern among the local population.
“For the Cabinet to overturn a High Court order, it’s worrying,” said Zimbabwe Christian Vusumuzi Chirwa.
“We wonder if the Cabinet has replaced both the Supreme and Constitutional Courts,” he continued.
“Here is no need to force church congregants to be vaccinated [against COVID-19] when most of them only attend church services once a week for a couple of hours. In the church of Christ, there is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, vaccinated or unvaccinated; we shall all worship our God whether vaccinated or not.”
According to human rights lawyer Obert Kondongwe, who had represented the “uvaccinated” churchgoers in their successful court appeal, “There is no law currently in Zimbabwe which makes vaccination mandatory. Concomitantly, there is no criminal law which penalizes church gatherings of unvaccinated congregants.”
“It is trite that each person, having fully considered the implications and effects of vaccination, is expected to make a personal decision on whether or not to get vaccinated, and even to make a personal decision regarding the timing of such vaccination,” he continued.
With the FDA's decision to officially approve the Pfizer COVID jab, calls to vaccinate schoolchildren and more university students will become louder and more insistent.
But, America's children and young people must be protected from unknown future side-effects of these drugs, and parents' rights must be respected!
Please SIGN this urgent petition which demands that COVID vaccine mandates for schools and universities be prohibited in every U.S. state.
This petition will be sent to the leaders of every state legislature and to every governor in the United States, urging them to pass emergency legislation banning vaccine mandates for primary, secondary and university students.
Students simply have the right to be educated without being forced to violate deeply held principles and their own bodily integrity!
But, unfortunately, some private schools, like the Jesuit-run Brophy College Prep School in Phoenix, Arizona, have already mandated the COVID vaccine for their students, in spite of massive parental opposition. If parents or students reject the vaccine, students face intrusive weekly testing and exclusion from extra-curricular activities.
Also, more and more universities have actually started to disenroll unvaccinated students. But, even where that is not happening, not taking the vaccine often subjects students to masking, extra testing and additional administrative obstacles.
And now, with the Pfizer jab approval, Joe Biden's Surgeon General, Vivek Murthy, is threatening more mandates.
While it is true that the FDA approval for the Pfizer jab only pertains to those over 16 years of age, the pharmaceutical industry and some state actors have been pushing to get approval for pre-teens!
So, it stands to reason that the Federal government will try to impose vaccines on schools, for those 16 and over, as well as on all university students. But, eventually, such mandates could even apply to younger and younger schoolchildren.
That's why state legislatures and governors must fight back against any attempt to coerce school students to take a COVID vaccine against their will!
Science and logic should dictate public health policy. And both say that mandatory vaccination for children and university students is not only unnecessary, but very likely dangerous for the future health of America's youth.
The CDC reports that the rates of death, injury, and hospitalization are very, very low for children and adolescents and that COVID transmission in schools, both from student to staff and between students, is also very low.
And a European CDC study concluded that "no evidence has been found to suggest that children or educational settings are primary drivers of COVID transmission."
So, right now, we know that schoolchildren are at very low risk of becoming very ill as a result of COVID, or of even transmitting the virus.
But, we don't know how a hastily-prepared, unstudied vaccine will affect the health of millions of America's youth in the future.
Gambling with their future, and the future of our nation, should not even be entertained for one second!
Please SIGN and SHARE this urgent petition urging state legislatures to ban COVID vaccine mandates for schools and universities - both public and private. Urge them to respect parents' rights, informed consent and bodily integrity.
Thank you!
FOR MORE INFORMATION:
'Ivy League schools mandate COVID-19 vaccines for fall' - https://www.lifesitenews.com/news/ivy-league-mandates-covid-19-vaccines-for-the-fall/
'FDA approval of Pfizer jab isn’t about our health, it’s about mandating the shots' - https://www.lifesitenews.com/blogs/fda-approval-of-pfizer-jab-isnt-about-our-health-its-about-mandating-the-shots
Other Christians in Zimbabwe more explicitly alluded to dictatorship and tyranny after Mustvangwa indicated that the Cabinet was going to ignore the High Court ruling.
“This Cabinet, whoever they are, are definitely not a representation of the level of sound-minded Zimbabweans,” stated Zimbabwean Christian Qalani Nhliziyo.
“They represent a clique which has actually forcibly imposed itself on a reasoning population. They are not our legitimate leaders.”
“The High Court decision flies in the face of politics, and therefore they must ignore it so they can show who is powerful. This is the sad reality of our context,” lamented Kiton Moyo, another Christian.
“The government is setting itself for a dangerous warfare with God,” Moyo added.
“Soon He will respond. When you persecute the Church, you are persecuting Christ. So where does this take them?”
Zimbabwe boasts a large and faithful Christian population, with over 85% of the population identifying as Christian. Among this Christian majority, over 60% report they attend church weekly.
Meanwhile, Zimbabwe’s COVID-19 inoculation rate, including people who have had only one dose, is a mere 19%, and so this gives heft to the local theory that this governmental action is a direct persecution of Christians.
“There is the High Court ruling that must be respected,” said Zimbabwe Christian Alliance executive director Reverend Useni Sibanda.
“We encourage the government to uphold the High Court ruling.”
LifeSiteNews has produced an extensive COVID-19 vaccines resources page. View it here.