Participants receive information and advice on how to get involved in the pro-life movement.during the SpeakOut Illinois conference Feb. 2 at Drury Lane in Oakbrook Terrace.  

OAKBROOK TERRACE—Members from pro-life organizations across Illinois—such as Aid for Women, Lutherans for Life, Woman’s Choice Services, CareNet of DuPage and the Will County Right to Life—gathered Feb. 2 at the Drury Lane complex in Oakbrook Terrace for SpeakOut Illinois 2008, a conference focusing on the abortion issue.

Conference coordinator Tommie Romano estimated about 300 people were in attendance. Romano, a parishioner at St. Peter Parish in Skokie, told the Catholic Explorer the event started in 1991.

Eric Scheidler, a pro-life leader in the battle against the Planned Parenthood clinic in Aurora, helped open the conference with an update on the protest, saying people continue to pray outside the clinic.

“They are maintaining a continuous pro-life witness out at that facility. It’s a very difficult place to counsel, but it’s an easy place to pray,” said Scheidler, the communications director of the Pro-Life Action League. Additionally he told the audience a formal protest happens every month.

“It really has been a very fresh face of pro-life activism in Aurora; so many new people have been mobilized for the first time,” he commented during the event.

During his presentation, he gave a brief overview of the libel lawsuit against Planned Parenthood and the First Amendment lawsuit filed against the city of Aurora on behalf of the protesters.

Additionally Scheidler praised the “unprecedented” degree of cooperation between different faith communities during the protest.

Mary Anne Hackett, president of Catholic Citizens of Illinois, said, “The churches are always trying to improve ecumenical relations, but the way to improve them is to go to an abortion clinic and see who’s outside. I mean, all religions are at these clinics, and it’s by far not just Catholics.” Hackett serves on the conference planning committee.

Hackett, who is also president of Illinois Right to Life, said the conference seeks to educate and encourage participation in pro-life causes. “A lot of people are pro-life, but they don’t know a lot of the issues well.” Special sessions were held for teenagers and new people to the movement.

Jill Stanek, who maintains a pro-life Internet weblog, spoke at the conference. Her talk, “Blogging for Life,” focused on how the Internet has given pro-life supporters a new tool to communicate their message. During the conference Stanek was awarded the “Henry Hyde Life Leadership Award.”

Launched in 2005, Stanek’s pro-life blog elevated her to national prominence as a spokesperson for the movement. She has appeared on the Fox News Network and been quoted by the Chicago Tribune and the Los Angeles Times. She said 60,000 people visit her site every month.

In her presentation, Stanek claimed mainstream media under-reports or misreports pro-life stories, making pro-life supporters look bad. Frequently she uses her writing to challenge published stories about abortion. She also posts stories and pictures not found in regular media.

Dr. Angela Lanfranchi, a breast surgeon at Somerset Medical Center in Somerville, N.J., also presented at the conference, arguing a link between abortion and breast cancer.

Citing research findings she argued abortion increases breast cancer risk by stopping the development of cancer-resistant lobules in a woman’s breasts which naturally form during the second half of a pregnancy. She asserted that stopping a pregnancy early leaves a woman with more breast tissue susceptible to cancer because the type three and four lobules have not developed. Lanfranchi said whenever a woman carries a baby to full term, she decreases her risk of cancer.

Lanfranci, co-founder of the Breast Cancer Prevention Institute, said information about the link between breast cancer and abortion is hidden in most textbooks, and doctors frequently miss it.

While she admitted many scientists and doctors disagree with her, she accused them of deliberately ignoring or suppressing information about the link because of their personal biases. She also said pressure from funding sources has unduly influenced some researchers to alter their studies, skewing their data against finding a connection.