Title VII of the Civil Rights Act prohibits employment discrimination based on religion and requires that employers provide reasonable accommodations for employees' sincerely held religious beliefs, practices and observances. The COVID-19 pandemic and resulting employer vaccine mandates have brought this duty into sharp relief in the past year.

Employees—many of whom may never have expressed strong religious beliefs to their employer—are asserting vaccine-specific religious objections in unprecedented fashion.

While plaintiffs seeking religious exemptions from employer vaccine mandates subscribe to a variety of faiths, objections to receiving the COVID-19 vaccine have coalesced around the asserted beliefs that:

• It is morally wrong to receive a vaccine that used fetal cells in the development stage—the most commonly cited religious objection to the vaccines;
• The body is a temple that should not receive foreign or unnatural substances, and God will protect the body from sickness; and
• The immune system was created by God and should not be altered—often based on the misconception that the COVID-19 vaccine alters a recipient's DNA.

Often, these objections have been supported by conclusory assertions that, for example, receiving a vaccine that used fetal cells in the development stage is sinful. In some instances, plaintiffs have cited specific Bible verses to support their opposition to the vaccine, such as I Corinthians 6:19, Psalm 139:13 and Isaiah 49:1.

Whatever the...

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