ILOILO CITY, Philippines—Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines president and Jaro Archbishop Angel Lagdameo will lead a prayer rally here on Thursday against the reproductive health bill pending in Congress.

The rally is just one of the protest actions to be mounted by the Catholic Church to highlight its campaign to kill the measure that seeks to control the country’s population growth, currently one of the highest in the world at 2.36 percent every year, by educating couples on their choices of artificial and natural birth control methods.

The rally set to start at 2 p.m. at the Iloilo Freedom Grandstand is expected to draw thousands of students from Church-run schools, parishioners of the Jaro Archdiocese and lay organizations, according to Fr. Ian Teves, spokesperson of the Jaro Archdiocese.

Lagdameo said last week that the Catholic Church would step up its campaign against the bill to prevent its passage.

He stressed that the Church would support only natural family planning methods such as the Basal Body Temperature and Billings Ovulation Method.

But he said the RH bill in Congress, which would push the free distribution of artificial contraceptives such as pills, condoms and IUD, would be against the teachings of the Church.

He called the proposed legislation as "DEATH Bills because they ultimately lead to Divorce, Euthanasia, Abortion, Total Reproductive Health and Homosexuality."

The prelate said they were confident that their allies in Congress would block the bill.

"There are pro-life senators and congressmen who support our stand. They may not be many but we trust them," Lagdameo said.