Our Leadership

Jor-El Godsey | President

Jor-El Godsey serves as President of Heartbeat International. He leads a staff dedicated to equipping, empowering, and encouraging the thousands of leaders and developing leaders of Heartbeat’s affiliated pregnancy help centers, maternity homes, and adoption services, in the U.S. and on every inhabited continent. He oversees Heartbeat’s core mission to be the leadership supply line for the growing pregnancy help movement worldwide by providing accurate information, training resources, leadership development conferences, programs, and daily support to help affiliates start, grow, and expand their services to women and couples at risk for abortion.

Jor-El comes to Heartbeat having served in the pregnancy help movement since 1988. He first served as a volunteer at Hope, the pregnancy help centers in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida. Then he joined their board, served as Chair, then as Executive Administrator. In 1999, Jor-El became Executive Director of Life Choices in Longmont, Colorado. Six years later, in 2006, Jor-El accepted the call to help Heartbeat International meet the diverse and expanding leadership needs of the pregnancy help movement as Vice President.

Jor-El met his wife, Karen, at a volunteer training meeting for the Hope Center in Ft. Lauderdale. They now have three children.

Cindi Boston-Bilotta | Vice President of Mission Advancement

A long-time leader in the pregnancy help community at the local, state, and national levels, Cindi Boston was named Heartbeat International’s Vice President in January 2016.

Cindi previously served on Heartbeat International’s Board of Directors from 2013-15, and was recognized as a 2011 Heartbeat International Servant-Leader honoree. She chaired the board for Missouri’s Alliance for Life that played a role in passing a state resolution honoring the work of pregnancy help organizations, as well as directing funds for specific services covered under Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF).

Andrea Trudden | Vice President of Communications & Marketing

Andrea oversees the public face of Heartbeat International and its network of more than 3,000 pregnancy help organizations worldwide as VP of Communications & Marketing. Beginning her professional career in radio while obtaining a degree in Journalism and Communications from The Ohio State University, she took the skills she received in speaking and writing and joined the noble cause of the pro-life movement. Andrea is one of the voices of Heartbeat featured in radio and television interviews, sharing the many ways that pregnancy help empowers women to make positive choices for themselves and their families. 

Andrea and her husband Dan have three precocious children who plan to change the world when they are grown.

Our Board

Gary Thome | Board Chairman

Gary Thome is a seasoned executive from the technology industry. He retired in 2020 after 32 years to focus on ministry work and spend more time with family. He has served previously on the Heartbeat International Board of Directors from 2012-2022, serving as board treasurer. His pro-life work also includes an initiative to support parents receiving a prenatal diagnosis. He is the founder of LOVING STONES of CHRIST, a lay apostolate focused on making disciples and sending apostles in Catholic parishes. He and his wife Pam have five children and reside in Houston, Texas.

Ron Blake

Ronald Blake is the retired President and CEO of Rewards Network. Over his professional career, he has worked with several private equity firms, following a long career in telecommunications industry.

Ron has also served as the Chairman of the Foundation for Higher Education, was Vice President and Treasurer of Alverno College (a Catholic women's college) and a trustee of the Shedd Aquarium in Chicago.

Ron has been married to Merilee Blake for 38 years. They have two children and two grandchildren.

Lucia Barone

Lucia Barone has served in Pregnancy Center ministry for over 30 years. Originally from New Jersey, she and her husband have called Naples, Florida home for the past 33 years. A graduate of Seton Hall University, Lucia has been involved in several pro-life efforts from advocacy, outreach and education.

The focus of her involvement has been in Pregnancy Center ministry. Shortly after moving to Naples in 1991, she served as a volunteer then Board member, including serving as Board Chair for over 20 years at Community Pregnancy Clinics (CPCI) in Naples. She currently serves as a Director on the CPCI Board, one of the largest networks of Pregnancy Medical Clinics in the State of Florida.

Lucia is also a Dame in the Order of Malta, a lay religious Order with a focus on serving and ministering to the poor and the sick. She and her husband lead the weekly Malta prayer witness at the local abortion clinic.

She and her husband of 47 years, BJ, have 3 married children and are blessed with 8 amazing grandchildren.

Shiney Daniel

Shiney Daniel is the CEO, Administrator, and Attorney for Agape Home Healthcare, which she started in 1994. She has been an entrepreneur since a very young age and has started and owned a number of companies and organizations. She has served on various boards and has held a variety of leadership positions.  

Shiney has been happily married to Pastor Shaji K Daniel, a businessman, pastor, and international conference speaker since 1993. Together, they have founded a Agape Bible School and Agape English School in Kerala, India.  They have established churches in India, the Middle East, and Texas.

Jamie Oreffice

Jamie left a thriving career as a network consultant to Fortune 500 companies worldwide, in banking, retail and insurance to raise children. As a long-time pro-life advocate, she has served
on the foster care review board in Arizona, on the board of an adoption agency in Georgia, and as co-founder of Catholics Adopt Project. She was also Director of Admissions and Marketing at
Pinecrest Academy, a private Catholic school. Jamie graduated from the University of Michigan and holds an MBA from the University of North Carolina.

The parents of two adopted children, Andy and Jamie founded the Catholics Adopt Project in 2023 to build awareness and provide resources to assist Catholic Families with their adoption journey. They have become sought-after speakers on the topic of adoption.

Jamie has volunteered and run many apostolates over the years, including marriage classes for women on how to make your marriage a lifelong love affair, mentor couple for marriage preparation, coaching high school volleyball and tennis, consulting with pregnancy clinics in Atlanta and North Carolina, and consulting with prospective adoptive couples. In her spare
time, Jamie can be found riding and jumping her horse, playing tennis/pickleball, or golf.

Jamie married Andy, the love of her life, in 1994 and live in Cumming, GA, a northern suburb of Atlanta. They have four children - 2 biological (ages 30, 27) and 2 adopted (ages 18,15).

Terry Hall

Terry was born in Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario. He and his wife have been married since 1972, and are blessed with six children and eighteen grandchildren. Terry became a dual citizen in September of 2017. He holds a master’s degree in statistics from the University of Waterloo and spent much of his professional career in the enterprise software sector. Primarily serving with Cognos Corporation, Terry was Chief Operating Officer from 1998-2002 and Senior Vice President of Worldwide Sales from 1993-1998. His roles included the oversight of global revenue and operations across the U.S., Canada, Germany, U.K., France, Belgium, Sweden, Japan, South Africa, Singapore, and Australia. Managing international divisions led to family relocations, including to the U.S. (Massachusetts), Europe (Holland), and Australia (Sydney). Since 2006, Terry has served on the board of Pregnancy Care Canada and recently assumed the role of Chairman in 2025.

Ann Laird

Ann Laird

Ann Laird is a wife and mother of three married children. Her favorite pastime is loving on her eight grandchildren. She has served her church and the Houston community in numerous Christian ministries. Her first pregnancy help center experience was at Anderson House in Carrizo Springs, Texas. It was not a coincidence that just a few weeks later she and her husband, Marc, became avid, passionate supporters of Heartbeat International.

Linda Ruf

Linda Ruf is CEO of the St. John Paul II Life Center and Vitae Clinic in Austin, Texas, a unique model that combines a Natural OB/GYN practice with a pregnancy care center. Their mission is to empower women to choose life and support both mother and baby with compassionate medical, emotional, and financial care. Prior to her role as CEO, Linda served as Executive VP- Development for Relevant Radio, retiring in Jan 2020 after ten years of helping expand the Relevant Radio network nationwide. Linda began her career as a CPA with Price Waterhouse, retiring to raise six children with her husband, Ben, in Chicago, IL. Linda and Ben currently reside in Austin, TX. She is the proud grandmother of six and continues to be motivated by St. John Paul II’s encouraging words, “Place your intelligence, your talents, your enthusiasm, your compassion and your fortitude at the service of life!"

Catherine M Stark, M.D.

Dr. Catherine Stark is a board certified OB/GYN, who has been a practicing pro life physician for 30 years in southeast Michigan. Throughout her career, she has worked with several Pro-Life pregnancy medical centers in the Detroit area.  Since 2018, Dr. Stark has been a member of the Abortion Pill Reversal Network, and serves on the APRN Medical Advisory Board for Heartbeat International. Dr. Stark retired in 2022 from her private group practice, and she is now focusing on Pro Life advocacy. She is currently the medical director for three Michigan Pregnancy Centers, two of which now offer free early prenatal care to uninsured women. In her spare time, she enjoys traveling and spending time with her 14 grandchildren.

Zeke Swift

Zeke Swift brings 23 years of global marketing, issue management and organization design experience at Procter & Gamble, the world’s largest consumer product company. Prior to P&G, Zeke had six years of commissioned service in the US Army. Zeke co-founded the Southern Africa HIV-AIDS Collaboration (SAHAC) and consults with for-profit and not-for-profit organizations in the areas of strategy, organization development and issue management.

Stephen Wallace

Stephen Wallace is the Managing Partner of the Downs Law Firm, an estate planning firm in Laurel, Maryland. Stephen and his wife met at Franciscan University of Steubenville and have six children. After graduating from Notre Dame Law School and practicing law at a commercial litigation firm in Washington, D.C., Stephen served for seven years as Executive Director of Gabriel Network, a Christian pregnancy support nonprofit that provides church-based support and maternity housing in Maryland and D.C. During that time Stephen was privileged to serve as Chairman of the National Maternity Housing Coalition and worked closely with Heartbeat International’s team to nurture maternity homes across the country.

Dr. Peggy Hartshorn, Ph.D. | President Emeritus

Peggy served on the Heartbeat International Board for 40 years, 23 of those years as President, and 17 as Board Chair.  

Peggy and her husband Mike started working as volunteers in the pro-life movement immediately after Roe v. Wade in 1973, began housing pregnancy mothers in their home in 1975, opened a Heartbeat affiliated pregnancy help center in Columbus, Ohio in 1981, and started into Heartbeat leadership in 1986.

Peggy continues to serve the pregnancy help movement by writing, speaking, and representing Heartbeat both nationally and internationally, and, as a Heartbeat Consultant, she teaches and trains, with a special focus on Board Governance.

Peggy is the author of The LOVE Approach for the pregnancy help movement, now in book form, The L.O.V.E. Approach: 4 Proven Steps to Transforming Relationships in Your Family, Church, and Community, and also co-author, with Jor-El Godsey, of The Power of Pregnancy Help: The First 50 Years. 

She and Mike have been married over 50 years and have two children (adopted as infants) and 5 grandchildren.