Last June, the United States Supreme Court issued its decision Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization. That decision overturned nearly 50 years of the United States living under the flawed Supreme Court decision, Roe v. Wade, that legalized abortion in our country. 

 

At that time, looking to the future of the work to foster respect for life of the unborn, I wrote in this column, “The issue now returns to the states with local legislators empowered to formulate the nature and levels of protections. That process is likely to be long, drawn out, and in need of our Catholic witness and commitment to both mothers and to their babies in the womb. As Catholics we need to be prepared to bring our contribution based in faith.”

 

Another phase of the struggle to protect life and to inform consciences in our own state of Illinois is now upon us. Currently, the Illinois legislature is debating SB 1909 which seeks to amend the Consumer Fraud and Deceptive Business Practices Act. 

 

According to the Catholic Conference of Illinois (CCI), the public policy voice of the Illinois bishops and lay Catholics, SB1909 “targets the services provided by pregnancy help centers and sidewalk counselors by subjecting them to fines of up to $50,000 for engaging in ‘unfair methods of competition or unfair or deceptive acts or practices’ for any concealment, suppression, or omission of a ‘material fact’ as it relates to abortion.”

 

Many people of faith and, more widely, people who follow reason and science help mothers in crisis due to a pregnancy. They offer counseling and services that assist both mother and child. In this way life-supporting alternatives as well as personal and material assistance are made available which would remove the pressures to solve a problem pregnancy by recourse to abortion. 

 

To accomplish this there are centers erected for this purpose, and at times counselors stand, pray and converse near facilities offering abortion services. Their goal is simply to offer information and support to an expectant mother about her options. 

 

The reality is, then, that in this constitutionally ordered society of ours, which prides itself on the freedom of speech and the freedom of religion, donors and volunteers have for decades offered their time, effort and money to care for women and their pregnancies in their moment of crisis. And they have helped after the child is born as well. How could we as a people object to this effort to inform a mother’s choice?

 

The proposed bill, under the guise of fairness and protecting against manipulation of vulnerable women, is in fact targeting the protected speech around the reality of abortion. As the CCI notes, the language of the bill is broad and undefined. “There is no guidance as to what are ‘unfair methods of competition or unfair or deceptive acts or practices’ or what is a ‘material fact.’”

 

In this way, supporters of abortion seek to use the legal system to shackle those who seek to assist mothers and their preborn children. This legislation is intended to have a chilling effect on, and to put an end to, the carrying out of the freedom of speech and the free exercise of religious liberty. It seeks to make people of good will and of faith fearful of being a presence outside abortion facilities and offering alternatives to women about to enter an abortion facility. Investigations and crippling fines would be the resultant tools flowing from this legislation for people of faith and goodwill who reach out to assist expectant mothers with a lifegiving alternative to abortion.

 

The proposed bill would also be in potential conflict with another decision of the United States Supreme Court, NIFLA v. Becerra which was issued in 2018. According to the Becket Fund, that decision “protect[ed] pro-life pregnancy centers’ right to serve women and children according to their religious mission.”

 

We are called to witness to our faith in this increasingly hostile society in many ways. The offering of love and support for expectant mothers and their unborn child is a clear example. Please pray for and support those who engage in this important effort in favor of the dignity of human life. Contact your legislators, both State Senators and Representatives, to urge them to oppose this unjust law. You can go to http://www.ilcatholic.org for help contacting your elected representative or to http://www.ilcatholic.org for the latest on this legislation. 

 

Above all, we must seek to love others and to change hearts so that God’s gift of human life is loved and respected.