An Evangelical Network and Covid Vaccine Alarmism

From British Christian magazine Woman Alive, last month:

Former midwife Laura Brett says she has been called an ‘anti-vaxxer’ and ‘conspiracy theorist’. Here she explains how asking questions led to her personal conviction that no one should have been pressured into taking the Covid-19 vaccine.

Brett alleges that Covid vaccination is “one of the biggest medical frauds in history”, and she writes that in October 2023

we gathered 100 church leaders, heads of charities and other prominent people in the Houses of Parliament to worship, pray and provide evidence-based information about the truth concerning Covid-19 and the vaccination programme

The “hook” for the article was AstraZeneca’s admission in court documents that their vaccine can in rare cases cause blood clots. Although this has been widely known now for several years, the acknowledgement had been presented sensationally in the media as a new development.

Brett is the author of a book called Losing Liberty, Finding Freedom, and as well as being a “former midwife” she describes herself as “an evangelist, a qualified midwife, international speaker, mentor and activist… positioned at the frontline of Christian ministry”. The book came out last last year, and the back cover features a blurb from none other than Covid conspiracist Michael Yeadon praising the work as “a loud bright celebration of the power and greatness of God!” The book was launched first in Williamsburg, VA, but then also in London in January this year: attendees (H/T @PozzyWozzy) included Andrew Bridgen MP, as well as Lara Fawcett, a PR agent known primarily to the public as Bear Grylls’ sister. Bridgen has posted some photos, including one in which he and Fawcett pose in front of a hanging t-shirt bearing the words “conspiracy theorist”.

The front cover of the book, meanwhile, comes with blurb from “Rev Richard Fothergill, Founder and CEO of the Filling Station Trust”. Fothergill was in the news a year ago, after he was “de-banked” after writing to the Yorkshire Building Society “to complain about their public messaging during Pride month”, particular as regards “gender ideology”. The “Filling Station Trust” organises “celebration meetings” around the country, meaning worship sessions along evangelical/Charismatic lines. This is Brett’s own affiliation, and Fothergill is on board with her anti-Covid vaccination alarmism. Writing a comment on the Premier Christian Radio Facebook page, he recently expressed the view that

The eminent Proff [unidentified] got it very wrong. The Vax was never suggested as being ‘experimental’. It was forced on us as a necessity. ‘Don’t kill granny’ remember? We were lied to and now those who did this hope to brush it all under the carpet. Evil days 2020-2022.

In the same thread, Brett adds:

We are happy to pray for anyone who is vax injured or worried they might be and we pray deliverance of all the spike proteins etc. We do this all the time at Harrogate Filling Station. Just get in touch via email and we can do that via zoom. The Lord heals!

Alongside running the Filling Station network, Fothergill is also “Trustee & Relational Covering” of a Christian coffee shop project in Yeovil called “Bread”, run by an evangelist named Dominic Muir. Muir’s other projects include “the Wesley Academy”, where he is listed as “Minister” alongside Rev Dr Joseph Boot, Virginia Logan, Sam Kyung-Min Lee and Joseph Buthee, described as “Bread Church coffee shop manager”. However, Buthee has more recently been active in London, and he recently led the Lord’s Prayer at the recent Tommy Robinson rally in London. Robinson has himself joined the Covid antivax bandwagon, and in September last year he was photographed with Bridgen at a conference in Denmark.