Illinois expands abortion — while America’s birthrate crashes
My dear brothers and sisters in Christ,
We need to fast and pray very hard for the conversion of Gov. J.B. Pritzker and other pro-abortion Democrats, that they may have a change of mind and heart in their campaign against having babies. Gov. Pritzker signed two bills on Aug. 22, expanding protections to abortion providers and making contraceptives and abortion pills more accessible to college students.
HB 3709 requires public colleges and universities to offer contraceptives and abortion pills if the schools have an on-campus pharmacy or student health center, beginning in the 2025-2026 school year. HB 3637 shields abortion providers, including licensed midwives and wholesale drug distributors, from discipline in Illinois if they lose their license, registration, or permit in another state for violating that state’s laws prohibiting abortion.
In praising Gov. Pritzker for signing these pro-abortion bills, Planned Parenthood issued a statement saying, “House Bill 3637 directly addresses federal attempts to restrict access to the medication abortion pill mifepristone. This law will ensure that Illinois healthcare providers can continue to offer this safe and effective medication, protecting a vital component of reproductive care.” Of course, that is a lie. First of all, “reproductive care” is their euphemism for abortion, because abortion is never safe, always resulting in the death of at least one person, the baby. Secondly, the abortion pill mifepristone has been shown to cause complications that may threaten the life of the mother.
A study published by the National Center for Biotechnology Information on “Deaths and Severe Adverse Events after the use of Mifepristone as an Abortifacient from September 2000 to February 2019” found that “Significant morbidity and mortality have occurred following the use of mifepristone as an abortifacient.” According to the study, there were 2,660 Adverse Event Reports for mifepristone used as an abortifacient, submitted to the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) from September 2000 to February 2019. Of these, 20 were deaths, 529 were life-threatening, 1,957 were severe, 151 were moderate, and three were mild. The cause of death from the use of mifepristone in most cases was “retained products of conception and hemorrhage.”
Another comprehensive report, issued by the Ethics and Public Policy Center on April 28, 2025, analyzed public and private insurance claims submitted by 330 million U.S. patients over a span of seven years, from 2017 to 2023. According to the study, 10.93 percent of the 865,727 women prescribed chemical abortions using the drug mifepristone suffered a serious adverse event like sepsis or hemorrhaging within 45 days after taking the drug.
The other negative consequence of promoting contraception and abortion is the decline in the fertility rate. In April 2025, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced that the total fertility rate was 1.6 children per woman in the United States, or 1,626.5 births per 1,000 women. That is well below the total fertility rate of 2.1 needed to maintain the population naturally.
As explained in 60 Minutes Overtime by CBS News on Aug. 17, 2025, “The worrisome scenario for countries who face low birth rates is a small young population and a much larger elderly population. In theory, a smaller young population would not be able to contribute to the workforce, attend schools and universities, pay for goods and services, pay taxes, start businesses and create economic growth at the level that the previous generation did, since there would simply not be enough people to contribute at the same scale. In that scenario, institutions used to larger amounts of young people, like hospitals, schools, and businesses, wouldn’t have the number of patients, students, and customers needed to maintain growth. And that could create economic decline and unemployment due to reduced demand.”
Some people choose not to have children for purely selfish reasons. A story published in the July 22, 2024, print edition of The Wall Street Journal entitled, “More Americans Opt Not to Have Children,” described a couple that moved to New Orleans “in search of the city’s joie de vivre — and other childless millennials. With a combined income of $280,000, the couple is able to put about $4,500 a month toward what they hope will be a mid-50s retirement. Another $2,600 pays rent on a sprawling Creole townhouse. The remaining $8,000 or so — much of which they assume would have been eaten up by child-rearing — goes primarily toward enjoying their lives.”
According to Anastasia Berg, co-author with Rachel Wiseman of the book What Are Children For?: On Ambivalence and Choice, “To be a human being, for most people, meant to have children. You didn’t think about how much it would cost, it was taken for granted.”
Certainly there are legitimate reasons why some married couples cannot have large families or may not be able to have any children at all, nevertheless the trend toward people choosing not to have children is troubling and is a growing source of concern. The Catholic Church calls for married couples to be open to life. Yes, that involves sacrifice, but Christians are called to sacrifice for others as a matter of love, the love that parents have for their children, as well as the love that all people should have for the common good of the human race.
May God give us this grace. Amen.
Sources:
25-04-The-Abortion-Pill-Harms-Women.pdf
The trends behind the historically low U.S. birth rate – CBS News