Our culture deals with the pervasive sin of sexual immorality to the point where many people just view sex outside of marriage (in every way possible) as “normal.”

It’s a serious problem, and the root of a lot of the current cultural chaos.

At Illinois Family Institute’s 2023 Worldview Conference, Dr. John Diggs spoke on “The Consequences of Sexual Immorality.” He does a deep dive into the consequences of sexual immorality, including STD’s, why it’s such big deal, and how the confusion about gender increases unbiblical disorder.

Please watch and share!

Mandated Vaccines & the “LGBTQ” Agenda

A troubling trend is occurring in Illinois. It has happened mostly in the background but has become visible with the introduction of two new proposed laws concerning vaccines. If these proposed laws were to take effect, vaccines would be mandated by the state without religious exception. In addition, these bills apply to public and private schools, including Christian private schools and homeschools. Especially egregious would be the mandate for children to receive the HPV vaccine, a vaccine to protect a person from a sexually transmitted disease. Furthermore, and perhaps even more shocking, if this legislation passes, 14-year-olds will be able to receive vaccines without parental consent.

This isn’t the only erosion of parental rights in Illinois. “Progressives” in the Illinois legislature are also seeking to “teach” our children their “good news” on sex. Desiring to mandate a new curriculum on sex and sexuality through two new sex ed bills, there is a concerted push to normalize behaviors and a worldview starting in kindergarten that is anti-Christian. This includes teaching that novel “gender expressions,” pre-marital and non-marital sex, and non-monogamous heterosexual families are moral goods. If these bills become law, your kids will be indoctrinated with a new sexual ethic that is entirely different from that which has been taught for two millennia.

In Illinois, minors can receive an abortion without parental consent with only a judicial waiver. According to the ACLU, no judicial waiver has ever been denied.

If a minor enters into the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services (DCFS), the state will provide “gender transitioning” medical treatment, mental health “LGBTQ” advocacy, and placement in “affirming” households whether or not the parents agree. On their website, DCFS states that every child deserves these “rights,” and that these rights include children not in the DCFS system. For now, the law stops them from imposing their worldview on non-DCFS kids. Unless the state’s expansive powers are stopped, it’s not hard to imagine something that should scare all of us. We are on a trajectory where children will be removed from their parents because the parents will not embrace a child’s decisions on his sexuality or “gender identity.”

There are other examples, but these should suffice to show you what Illinois believes. In a new school guidance report that was ordered by Gov. JB Pritzker, the authors assert that schools have an obligation to act as a parent. DCFS also calls itself a parent, and the judge permitting an abortion without parental consent is acting as a parent. The state of Illinois believes it has a stronger claim to parent your child than you do, but the state of Illinois is wrong.

Biological parents are almost always better situated to parent than the state. In his essay “Of Paternal Power,” John Locke has written the strongest and most enduring Judeo-Christian argument for the preeminence of parental rights in modern society.

Parents have the freedom to raise their children as they see fit because this freedom is from nature and is not a right given by the state. Locke writes that parents have “a power over their children and have as much right to their subjection as those who are in the state of Nature.”

For Locke, Nature is the order of creation, and natural laws flow from this order. One of Nature’s laws is that the couple who births a child is a “temporary government” for that child. In other words, in the same way an adult is subject to civil authorities, a child is subject to his parents while he is a minor. The state of Illinois is usurping one of the most fundamental relationships in human society. Its intervention is about the indoctrination of children with a leftist worldview that stands diametrically opposed to a Judeo-Christian worldview. In a state that has more corruption than it does farmland, the last responsibility it should have is the right to indoctrinate our children.

According to Locke, this “temporary government” is built upon parental obligations. The parents have freedom in raising their child because at the end of the day it is their responsibility to do so. Locke writes,

The power, then, that parents have over their children arises from that duty which is incumbent on them, to take care of their offspring during the imperfect state of childhood. To inform the mind, and govern the actions of their yet ignorant nonage, till reason shall take its place and ease them of that trouble … .

This includes the healthcare and education of the child. As a parent, I do not want my children exposed to “LGBTQ” ideology that normalizes what our faith says is sin. Based on science and common sense, “gender” isn’t a personal opinion or a subjective feeling. I will raise my children as the “gender” that is expressed in their sex; this is based on my understanding of gender being a gift from God and a revelation of the image of God in humanity.

My children are vaccinated, but I find it deeply offensive that Illinois would mandate a drug to prevent a sexually transmitted disease. The mandate gives sexual license to my children that I deeply disagree with. These legal mandates are the height of hubris. We must not give away our obligation to parent to the state. If it’s not obvious, Illinois has no idea what it is doing.

In the most serious error of the Illinois parental state, the child is being given adult rights without parental oversight. In what world can a minor be expected to make informed, rational decisions on deeply complex moral and life-changing choices? Locke writes,

Commonwealths themselves take notice of, and allow that there is a time when men are to begin to act like free men, and therefore, till that time, require not oaths of fealty or allegiance, or other public owning of, or submission to, the government of their countries.

Children are not required to act as adults because they are not adults. Children need parents. This is because, according to Locke, they are in the period of “ignorant nonage.” Parents make the decisions “till reason shall take its place and ease them of that trouble.”

The idea that the state would empower kids to decide on invasive medical procedures or embrace novel sexual expressions reveals a society collectively jumping off a cliff. By the very fact of being a child, they lack mature rationality and the ability to understand the effects of decisions, and they have an underdeveloped moral system. When the state intervenes, it interjects its opinions on life, sexuality, and marriage that are radically contradictory to a Christian view of the world. Such interventions are outrageous.

Dear parents in Illinois, please take notice of what is happening. Call your state lawmakers and Governor Pritzker to stop the two pieces of legislation concerning vaccines and the sex education legislation. Then, it’s time to take back parental rights. Our children are our responsibility. Their future, their faith and their well-being are dependent on us pushing back the intrusions of the state. It’s time for parents to fight for our children. Right now, the state is fighting harder for them.

Take ACTION: Click HERE to send a message to your state senator and state representative to ask them to vote against these bills: SB 3788, HB 4870 and HB 5012. Impressionable students in public schools should not be exposed to body- and soul-destroying messages that promote leftist beliefs about sexuality.

THIS SATURDAY! IFI is hosting our annual Worldview Conference on March 7th at the Village Church of Barrington. This year’s conference is titled “Thinking Biblically About Our Corrosive Culture” and features Dr. Michael Brown and Dr. Rob Gagnon. For more information, please click HERE for a flyer or click the button below to register for the conference.

Written by Trevor Thomas

A timely and stunning statistic befitting the recent death of America’s patriarch of pornography: a shocking 110 million Americans — over one-third of our population — are saddled with a sexually transmitted disease. According to the New York Times,

The incidence of chlamydia, gonorrhea and syphilis is increasing, according to a new report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. An estimated 110 million Americans now are infected with a sexually transmitted disease.

Chlamydia is the most common S.T.D., and the number of cases rose 4.7 percent from 2015 to 2016… Adolescents and young adult women have the highest rates of chlamydia: one survey found that 9.2 percent of girls aged 15 to 19 were infected… The rate of primary and secondary syphilis in 2016 is the highest it has been since 1993, and it increased among both men and women from 2015 to 2016. Men account for almost 90 percent of cases, and most are among men who have sex with men.

Rates of syphilis increased in every age group and all races, and they were highest among people in their twenties.

Additionally, more than one out of every six people aged 14 to 49 has genital herpes. (Thus the rise of all of the Valtrex commercials on TV.) Among many other tragic outcomes, the rampant rate of STDs in America is the real legacy of notorious sexual provocateur, Hugh Hefner. Thanks to the desire to make our own rules when it comes to sex, following the lead of Hefner and his like-minded moral deviants, we find ourselves with STD rates in the U.S. at an all-time high. According to the CDC, there are more than 20 million new cases of STDs in the United States every year. As CNN recently reported,

“STDs are out of control with enormous health implications for Americans,” said David Harvey, executive director of the National Coalition of STD Directors. The coalition represents state, local and territorial health departments who focus on preventing STDs.

“If not treated, gonorrhea, chlamydia and syphilis can have serious consequences, such as infertility, neurological issues, and an increased risk for HIV,” said Harvey.

Also among the “serious consequences” of many of these STDs: cancer. In addition to cervical cancer, which is caused by certain types of the STD, Human Papilloma Virus, just days ago, the Los Angeles Times reported on (surprise!) the “anal cancer epidemic” that exists among homosexual and bisexual men. The article notes that men who engage in homosexual activity are 100 times more likely to contract anal cancer than HIV-negative men “who exclusively have sex with women.” The article also declares that, “Some in the medical community have identified anal cancer as the next big crisis among HIV-infected gay and bisexual men.” I have breaking news for the medical community: there will always be a “next big crisis” looming for men who treat the human septic canal as a vagina.

Nevertheless, and no-doubt taking their cues from perverts like Hefner, this past July, Teen Vogue — a magazine whose target audience is teenage girls — took it upon themselves to instruct their young readers on the finer points of sodomy. The article, entitled “Anal Sex: What You Need to Know” and subtitled, “How to do it the RIGHT way,” declares itself to be “anal 101, for teens, beginners, and all inquisitive folk.” The garbage piece ends with this shocking admission:

That being said, yes, you will come in contact with some fecal matter. You are entering a butthole. It is where poop comes out. Expecting to do anal play and see zero poop isn’t particularly realistic. It’s NOT a big deal. Everyone poops. Everyone has a butt.

This, from a member of the “party of science.” Forgetting to floss one’s teeth every now and then is “NOT a big deal.” Hillary’s choice of pant suits is “NOT a big deal.” Global climate change is “NOT a big deal.” Choosing to engage in sodomy — even once — can have horrific life-changing — even deadly — consequences. Of course, “anal 101” neglects to mention the rampant disease associated with such disgusting behavior. In other words, like Hefner’s Playboy magazine, Teen Vogue is an accomplice in the shocking rise of STDs among America’s youth.

In a sick attempt to justify promoting evil and dangerous sexual activity, just as they have with killing children in the womb, the left has now stooped to “normalizing” (an STD is “pretty bad*ss; it’s like a sex wound”) and even celebrating (with a “#ShoutYourStatus”) STDs. The perverse gotta pervert, I suppose. As Matt Barber concluded, political correctness needs to be declared an STD.

Of course, one need not contract an STD to suffer as a result of the plague of pornography. A 2015 UK Telegraph article on porn use among British youth contains a shocking revelation from a general practitioner (Sue):

“I’m afraid things are much worse than people suspect.” In recent years, Sue had treated growing numbers of teenage girls with internal injuries caused by frequent anal sex; not, as Sue found out, because she wanted to, or because she enjoyed it — on the contrary — but because a boy expected her to. “I’ll spare you the gruesome details,” said Sue, “but these girls are very young and slight and their bodies are simply not designed for that.”

No one’s body is “designed for that.” The boys were “expecting” such from their young girlfriends because they had bought into one of the many lies of porn. Instead of worrying over the condition of their skin or what earrings went with their new outfit, many of the young girls Sue was treating found themselves battling incontinence. Imagine the shame of a youth — because they bought a favorite and common lie of the left (sex without consequences), the muscles of their rectum are stretched out such that they must live in daily fear of soiling themselves.

Furthermore, the porn saturation of America, along with most of the rest of the Western world, has resulted in longtime and widespread devastation that extends far beyond the physical. If you think “saturation” too strong, consider:

People watched 4,392,486,580 hours of porn on PornHub in 2015. Just to put that in perspective, that means that in one year, people around the world spent 501,425 years watching pornography — on one porn site.

On PornHub, people watched 87,849,731,608 porn videos. As the porn site hastened to point out, that’s 12 porn videos viewed for every single person on the planet.

That, my friends, is the sad math of porn addiction. As a result, tens of millions of teens and adults worldwide have little to no idea what is a healthy sexual relationship, or, in many cases, how to have any type of a healthy relationship with those who share the gender of the objects of their sexual fantasies. Any notion of self-sacrifice and service to another is abandoned, and sex becomes an end unto itself. Regular porn consumers (especially men) literally lust after pornlike encounters in order to be sexually satisfied. In the minds of many men, porn has reduced women to a commodity to be consumed and an object to be abused (e.g., 50 Shades of Grey Dismay).

Breaking the bonds of trust between husbands and wives, porn has destroyed millions of American marriages. Porn use within a marriage leads to a long list of troubling issues. A recent study revealed that once porn enters a marriage, the chances of divorce double. Driven by lust that was born of porn consumption, millions of young adult Americans are shunning marriage in favor of the hook-up culture.

Thus, whether born out of wedlock, killed in the womb, or forced to witness the destruction of the most important human relationship in their lives, over the last six-plus decades, tens of millions of American children have suffered because of their parents’ selfish sexual desires. As I’ve noted before, if these children survive the womb, they face a wide array of difficulties.

Hugh Hefner was prince of the pimps. He was a destroyer of lives and cultures. The level of his destruction is so wide and deep that it will only be fully known in the light of eternity. If you are trapped in his world, turn and flee now. There is hope and healing, and there are those who can help.

Article originally posted at TheAmericanThinker.com.

Editor’s Note:  This bill could be called for a vote as early as this afternoon.
Please take a few minutes to contact your state senator today!

As noted in my last article on the comprehensive sex ed bill (HB 2675), no lawmakers in the Illinois House who supported the bill, including the sponsors, provided any research-based evidence during floor debates proving the superior effectiveness of comprehensive sex ed. In response to an inquiry from an Illinois citizen, State Representative Robyn Gabel (D-Evanston) provided two articles and one study in defense of her support for this troubling and unnecessary bill (currently any school district is free to use comprehensive sex ed curricula). Her use of these particular pieces of evidence demonstrates exactly what’s wrong with both this bill and the sloppy way it’s been promoted in Springfield.

The bill’s supporters cited the high rates of teen pregnancy and STDs as the reasons this proposed law is necessary. If passed this bill would mandate the use of what are called “comprehensive sex ed” or contraceptive-based “Sexual Risk Reduction” (SRR) curricula, while banning the use of what are called “abstinence-centered,” or “Sexual Risk Avoidance (SRA)” curricula in any school district that teaches about sexual health, which is virtually every school district in the state.

The two articles cited by Gabel are “Abstinence-Only-Until-Marriage Programs: Ineffective, Unethical, and Poor Public Health,” and “Review of Key Findings of ‘Emerging Answers 2007’ Report on Sex Education Programs.” The one study is “Abstinence-Only Education and Teen Pregnancy Rates: Why We Need Comprehensive Sex Education in the U.S.”

In addition to making arguable claims about abstinence education, neither of the articles even claims that comprehensive sex ed is more effective at reducing rates of teen pregnancies and STDs.

And the one study Gabel cites is a deeply flawed study from the University of Georgia (UGA) that addresses only teen pregnancy.

Mary Anne Mosack, National Director for State Initiatives of the National Abstinence Education Association writes this about the UGA study:

This study is a weak attempt to correlate high birth rates in states to abstinence education. Even the most basic understanding of research protocols, cautions against claiming causation based on correlation.  This study draws a very simplistic conclusion to the complex problem of teen pregnancy. There are numerous factors contributing to high teen birth rates not the least of which are family structure, poverty and cultural environment.

However, this study attempts to draw conclusions for a subset of the population (only students in abstinence education classes) by looking at data for an entire state population to establish their findings. This showcases an extremely flawed study design that not only invalidates findings but calls into question the motivation behind a study that purports to seriously inform public policy based on scientific rigor.

By examining state sex education laws alone the researchers make the erroneous conclusion that these laws accurately reflect what is actually being taught in schools and make no mention of the percentage of students in a state who actually received abstinence classes, a serious research error on which to base such sweeping conclusions!

Vast field experience across the country shows that contraceptive-based programs have been implemented in every state regardless of the law. Even the very anti-abstinence Guttmacher Institute concluded that only 25% of schools across the country were receiving abstinence education during the decade examined in this study. In actual practice, no state can be categorized as “abstinence-only.”

Further considerations must note this study does not indicate how a state is trending. Are they moving in the right or wrong direction? It is clear that abstinence opponents would like to take all the credit for the recent positive drop in teen birth rates while disingenuously attacking abstinence education. Producing a flawed study to make that claim is sad commentary on what should be a sincere attempt to effectively reach the youth we are trying to serve.

Here are two lessons we should learn from this embarrassing attempt by Rep. Gabel to justify the legal banning of the use of abstinence-centered education:

1. If the Left introduces, for example, three studies that say something negative about abstinence education and/or positive about comprehensive sex ed, and the Right introduces three studies that say something negative about  comprehensive sex ed and/or positive about abstinence-centered education, it’s a wash. Lawmakers can’t rationally mandate the use of one type of curriculum unless they can provide proof that it is consistently more effective at achieving some particular goal.
   
   
2. The bill’s supporters have told us what their goals are, and they can’t change goals when their lack of evidence for their stated goals is exposed. The bill’s sponsors stated that their goals are to reduce the rates of STDs and teen pregnancies. Gabel produced only one flawed study that addresses only one of those problems [the bill’s House sponsor State Representative Camille Lilly (D-Chicago) produced none]. The other two articles didn’t even claim that comprehensive sex ed is more effective than abstinence education at solving the problems of high rates of teen pregnancies and STDs. The articles make the arguable claims either that abstinence education hasn’t achieved its own goals or that it’s no more effective than comprehensive sex ed. Well, if the two types of curricula are roughly comparable, the Left can’t rationally ban only one of the two.

The Left continually misrepresents abstinence-centered (SRA) curricula and even created a term that embodies their misrepresentations: “abstinence-only education.” To those like State Representative Scott Drury (D-Highwood) who admitted he never even looked at an abstinence-centered curriculum before voting to ban them, this title suggests abstinence-centered education addresses only abstinence, which is false. Here is a description of the content of typical Sexual Risk Avoidance curricula:

SRA abstinence education teaches that “having sex” can potentially affect not only the physical aspect of a teen’s life but also, as research shows, can have emotional, psychological, social, economic, and educational consequences as well. That’s why topics frequently discussed in an SRA abstinence education class include how to develop a healthy relationship, how to avoid or get out of a dangerous, unhealthy, or abusive relationship, developing skills to make good decisions, setting goals for the future and taking realistic steps to reach them, understanding and avoiding STDs, information about contraceptives and their effectiveness against pregnancy and STDs, practical ways to avoid inappropriate sexual advances, and why saving sex for marriage is optimal.

Remember, if the evidence provided by our lawmakers doesn’t specifically address STD and teen pregnancy rates, it’s irrelevant. And if the evidence doesn’t prove conclusively that comprehensive sex ed is consistently more effective than abstinence-centered education in reducing teen pregnancy and STD rates, there is no justification for legally prohibiting the use of abstinence-centered curricula.

The evidence on the efficacy of abstinence-centered sex ed is certainly sufficient to allow school districts the right to choose it. For more clarification on the biased and inaccurate claims made about abstinence-centered sex education, click HERE.

Here are two articles of particular relevance on this website:

NAEA Report: Considerations for Protecting Teen Health: Part I will refute point by point the claims from the Guttmacher article on the effectiveness of comprehensive sex ed that Rep. Gabel cites.

Correcting Misinformation.

Take ACTION: Click HERE to send an email or a fax to your state senator today to ask him/her to vote NO to HB 2675.  You can also call the Capitol switchboard number at (217) 782-2000 and ask to be transferred to your state senator’s office or call IFI for their number.

Click HERE to make a donation to the Illinois Family Institute.

Last week the Centers for Disease Control released some frightening new numbers revealing that America is reaping what we have sown with our licentious culture and our war on values.  One in three Americans now have a sexually transmitted disease.  (The ratio is much closer to one out of two if you include only sexually active age groups.) 
 
We now have 20 million new sexually transmitted infections a year. Half of all new infections occur among those aged 15 to 24.  Today, 110 million Americans have a venereal disease, which costs the nation about $16 billion a year.  (Social problems carry huge financial price tags.)   
 
For a historic perspective of what we have unleashed upon our society consider this:  since the dawn of time until 1960, there were but two major Sexually Transmitted Diseases – syphilis and gonorrhea.   Today there are nearly 50 different kinds of STD’s and many of them are incurable or resistant to antibiotics.
 
Abstinence, fidelity and reclaiming a national moral ethic has never looked better or been more necessary.  Sex outside of marriage is a lot like medical Russian Roulette, but with only a three round revolver.  Sadly, the response to these new numbers has been more of the same from the likes of Planned Parenthood whose only answer is to offer more contraceptives. 

As Dr. Phil would sarcastically say, “How’s that been working for ya?”