WHO WE ARE

Cardinal Birth Midwifery & Advocacy Group started as a small doula & birth advocacy business in 2013 in Southeastern PA, owned by Abigail Iovine. Abigail is the founder of Cardinal Birth, and mother of ten.

After the birth of Abby’s 4th child in hospital, the devotion to women’s autonomy and traditional and religious practice was born, followed by years of training and apprenticeships and six more personal births at home (three midwife-guided & three unassisted) and a model of care was brought forth that honors the women, the family, & the Creator’s design.

CARDINAL BIRTH MIDWIFERY

Traditional Midwifery in Pennsylvania

A newborn baby sleeping on a gray surface with eyes closed, tiny features, and a relaxed expression.

WHY CHOOSE US?

Our work is guided by a higher calling, so our approach reflects timeless principles.

At Cardinal Birth, you are not a consumer—you are a mother. We honor women and families, not profit. We offer flexible payment options, including discounts for military families and those in need. If we’re not able to fulfill your support agreement, we do what’s right—with integrity and accountability.

Every pregnancy is sacred from the moment of conception.

We do not offer or refer for abortion. Support for early pregnancy loss is part of our mission of care and presence. We walk alongside families in miscarriage and grief, offering faith-based, non-clinical support and prayerful companionship.

We believe in collaborative, non-hierarchical support.

You are not handing over your power—you are being witnessed in it. Our role is not to direct your care, but to offer resources, encouragement, and respectful presence as you lead your pregnancy and birth journey.

Mothers are the primary decision-makers.

No one knows or loves your baby more than you do. We do not give medical advice or clinical recommendations. We offer information you can understand, spiritual encouragement, and space to decide what’s best for your family.

A Tradition of Support Rooted in Faith

Pregnancy is a natural part of life and a sacred journey. For generations, women have supported one another through the seasons of fertility, birth, and postpartum recovery—not as professionals, but as sisters, mothers, and stewards of ancient wisdom.

This work is not medical. It is spiritual, relational, and community-based. It does not replace doctors or hospitals. It exists alongside them—a different path, for those who are called to it.

In every generation, some women have been chosen to carry and pass down the knowledge of how to nurture, comfort, and stand with mothers. This includes:

How to prepare the body and spirit for labor
How to create peace and safety during birth
How to walk gently through loss and uncertainty
How to support newborn bonding, breastfeeding, and recovery
How to hold space when a mother just needs to be heard and seen

This is not medical advice or clinical treatment. It is lived experience, shared freely in the name of faith, family, and dignity.

A Calling to Serve

This is not a career. It is a calling from God—one that requires prayer, humility, and surrender. Those who serve in this way do so with reverence for life and obedience to a deeper purpose.

We do not act as authorities. We walk beside women as they reclaim what has always been theirs: the right to make decisions for themselves and their children, the right to give birth with peace and privacy, and the right to be surrounded by people who honor their faith and freedom.

We believe this kind of support is a human right— It belongs to every woman. It belongs to every community.

And above all, we believe:
God is the one who gives life, protects life, and carries women through it.

Legal Notice:

We are not licensed healthcare providers. We do not offer exams, procedures, prescriptions, or medical interpretation of labs or ultrasounds. Under Pennsylvania law—including SB507—midwifery without a license may be prosecuted as the unlicensed practice of medicine.

All support offered is non-clinical, faith-based, and parental-led. Learn More.

The word cardinal represents a profound importance.

This is birth. Birth is paramount. Birth is a cardinal moment in a family's existence.

Equally as profound, Northern Cardinals are a familiar and even nostalgic presence in Pennsylvania. They stand out with their crimson plumage, against the grey or snowy backdrop of chilly northeast winters.

That brilliant red cardinal cares for it's nesting mate, feeding and supporting her, as she tends their nest, grows their babies, and transition into motherhood.

This is in essence what a midwife lives for. Serving and caring for the pregnant woman & her family as they transition into a new family dynamic.

My goal is to offer you unparalleled care, so your birth stands out in your heart, as memorable, personal, and forever engrained as a positive, supported, and informed experience.

Your birth matters.

Our Philosophy

Why the Cardinal?

A vibrant red cardinal bird with a black face mask, perched on a dark branch against a blurred green background.

CORE BELIEFS

I believe in the Creator’s perfect design. Pregnancy, childbirth, and parenting, were designed to work.

I believe the ADVERSARY is actively attacking our unborn.

The LORD YHWH designed us perfectly - the intricate dance of physiology to keep a pregnancy healthy, and to give birth, and nourish a newborn, to become parents, to raise a family, it is intricately designed.

When we hand over this sacred process of growing and carrying life, to MAN - the cascade of damage is devastating.

Routinely stopping and changing the physiological process of pregnancy and labor, STOPS the physiological safeguards in the design, that are meant to serve the mother/baby.

Routinely using drugs (pitocin) that mimic the love hormone but instead destroy the capacity for oxytocin GENERATIONALLY-
(yes it effects your babies)
&
Routinely separating newborns at birth,

has been proven to create a human with diminished capacity to love.

Teaching families to sleep apart from their babies, to stop nursing, not to trust their parental instincts, to send kids away be taught by the government... this destroys the designed family and human structure that would work, and should work.

THIS is the work of the ADVERSARY -

I believe in fully autonomous care for the family. Every decision belongs to the family, even in birth care.

I believe birth is a normal physiological event. I believe the body is a physiological powerhouse, and provides us with numerous safeguards, as we labor and birth, as long as we leave AS MUCH AS POSSIBLE, untouched, and we make distinguished efforts to care for our bodies and babies with optimal nutrition.

I believe in Traditional Midwifery as the core for all birth care in human history.

There is no teaching, like the Art of Midwifery.

The Art of Normal Birth, quiet hands and mouths, patience for the process, an ear for the intuition of the laboring human and the attendant, and an eagle’s eye for what falls outside our parameters.

I believe in Evidence Based Maternity Care.

I believe it’s a human right, right to choose with whom, where and how you give birth.

I believe birth and the decisions therein, belong only to the family.

I believe providers owe complete transparency to their clients and the community.

Sun setting behind leafless bushes and trees with a colorful sky.

ABIGAIL IOVINE

Founder, Cardinal Birth Midwifery

My name is Abby.
I am a Born again, conservative, traditional midwife and medical freedom advocate, raised to love and honor God & family.

I’m also an 80’s baby!
We’re talking jazzercise, LAgear sneakers, and cassette tapes.
I had 7 digits in my landline.
(Am I too old for you to get that joke?)

I’ve been married for 20yrs and feel so lucky to be in this place with someone I love so much. We have 10 awesome kids — 4 born in hospital, and 6 at home.

Yes they are all mine.
Yes I have given birth 10 times.

5 boys and 5 girls.
Dont ask me which is “harder”

My best answer depends on when you ask..
When my boys took all the doorknobs off of every door on the second floor?

Or when my daughters fight?

I wont have a solid answer for you.

The midwifery bug bit me after the birth of my 4th child.

Pregnant with my 5th, I googled ;

”How to NOT have a baby in the hospital”

And here we are

3 of my homebirths were with local midwives,
and babies 8, 9 & 10 were family births, or “unassisted”.

BABY #10 was born JULY 2024!

We hope to be blessed with many more.
Hopefully the world can handle it. I’m sure I could handle another 5 or 6…

As homeschooling parents, We have given our children the freedom and autonomy of unschooling and life schooling. We
have musicians, photographers, artists, athletes and seamstresses, we have high order math junkies and computer building whiz kids, we have animal experts, and kids with jobs.

Our family owns several small businesses in dog training and property maintenance- & some of our kids are building their own.

We have one adult child (our oldest) who successfully graduated at 16 as a homeschooler. At 17, he ran off and joined the army. Soon after, got married, bought a home with his wife, and gave us our first grandchild in August of 2022 & our second grandchild in June 2025!

He does not want to be a midwife. Who knew?

We are proud to be practicing apostolic christians & doing our best at keeping holy days, clean diets, and keeping the laws set forth in scripture, to live a Christ-like life.

I wont lie, sometimes I say bad words.. or I forget to be nice-

We are perfectly imperfect, and honor real life as it is.

My hobbies include buying way too many houseplants, big dog and old world breed preservation, dog training and behavior, herpetology (reptiles) and other things that I probably waste too much money on. I also enjoy the nail salon. If you’re lucky, you may catch me playing the piano or singing.

Someday we’ll have a family Youtube channel. Just kidding.

My passions include adoption activism, birth consumer advocacy, teaching new birth workers, working with dogs, and buying plants.

Our family moved to the Lehigh Valley in 2013, we are both from the Philly area & suburbs.
- Holler at The Crefeld School-

-You might hear a Philly accent if you get me going, but dont get me started on NEPA cheesesteaks. Y’all are lucky I’m still here..

We moved to the Poconos recently, and expanded the practice into the Poconos.

I began studying midwifery in 2010, after the birth of our 5th child, and first homebirth. I became certified as a doula, and began attending births in 2013. My training has been under local elders, and spanned 5 years, in the traditional apprenticeship model.

Cardinal Birth Midwifery Officially began taking clients in 2018.

Cardinal Birth is a family centered, client autonomous family ministry. Here we honor the real life realities of kids, family, and life’s needs first.
We welcome families and children to prenatals and births, and lead a relaxed and open practice, where everyone is treated as equals, time management is flexible, and the pregnant woman is the lead in her care.

I am an incredibly transparent person, I love questions about my family or our lifestyle, my training or practice, so please feel free to ask.