The Life Challenges Podcast
The Life Challenges Podcast
A Conversation with Ann Tolly
Join us this week with our special guest, Ann Tolly, as she shares her remarkable 40-year journey in pro-life ministry. Ann's story demonstrates how God transforms our deepest wounds into our most profound purpose.
When Ann and her husband helped establish a pregnancy care center in Michigan, they couldn't have imagined the ripple effects their work would create. Ann shares pivotal moments that shaped her ministry—from establishing their mission statement, “saving lives for now and eternity,” to overcoming challenging counseling situations with women who initially rejected spiritual guidance. Her candid stories reveal both the struggles and triumphs of frontline pro-life work.
Perhaps most compelling are Ann's experiences counseling post-abortive women, many wrestling with suicidal thoughts. Her accounts directly challenge contemporary narratives that abortion has no lasting negative effects. With profound compassion, Ann describes how she guided these women toward healing and forgiveness through God’s Word. One particularly moving story involves a desperate late-night phone call that led to a life-saving intervention using Lutheran catechism teachings.
Ann’s legacy continues through countless lives touched and future generations saved. Whether you’re considering pro-life work or simply seeking inspiration, Ann’s testimony powerfully illustrates how ordinary people, yielded to God, can have an extraordinary impact in addressing one of our culture's most contentious issues with truth and compassion.
God, doubt, and proof walk into a podcast... it goes better than you’d expect!
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On today's episode with the dentist. Well, that sign eventually fell down, but I'll tell you the wonder of it all God's total protection continued us there year after year after year.
Paul Snamiska:Welcome to the Life Challenges podcast from Christian Life Resources. People today face many opportunities and struggles when it comes to issues of life and death, marriage and family, health and science. We're here to bring a fresh biblical perspective to these issues and more. Join us now for Life Challenges.
Christa Potratz:Hi and welcome back. I'm Krista Potratz and I'm here today with Pastor Bob Fleischman, and today we have a very special guest with us. Today we have Ann Tolley with us and we are going to be talking to her about her life and all of her work that she's done in the pro-life world. Bob would probably be the best person to make this introduction here to all of our listeners, because I believe you've known Anne for quite a while.
Bob Fleischmann:I think Anne and I go back what? 35 years or longer 40.
Bob Fleischmann:40 years. Yeah, I was trying to. Actually, my connection to Ann began with her first husband, del. Del Warner was a member of the CLR National Board, one of the early boards that we had, and Del and I shared hotel rooms when we were sometimes on the road and so forth. And then the momentous date came that I met Ann. Life hasn't been the same since. Ann had been a counselor for us in our Michigan one of our Michigan's pregnancy care centers, and just immediately we clicked and, to bring the introduction very tight and short, we began to tap Ann to travel around, do training for other counselors in our other centers, and then we even tapped her to go to Ukraine for us and do some work with training over there. So we have a long history. I won't tell all the stories about you, ann, if you don't tell all the stories about me.
Ann Tolly:It's a deal.
Christa Potratz:Ann, can you tell us a little bit about yourself and specifically to how you got into this line of work as well?
Ann Tolly:I was thinking about this and I wonder if it didn't begin when I was just a very little girl and liked to do scrapbooks. I was just a very little girl and liked to do scrapbooks. My friends would make scrapbooks with animal pictures and girls' dresses and dogs and cats and stuff, but I loved babies. I just positively loved babies, and I had the most beautiful scrapbook. My mother let me cut out all the baby pictures out of the magazines, so I attribute that to that. Was probably the Lord directing me at that time, I'm not sure, but I think so. And then, after that, of course, then I became 21. And that was when I married Del Warner and we were married 47 years when the Lord took him home.
Ann Tolly:And during those early days of dating, we were, we were getting serious, we talked about children and we both wanted children and that had to be, or I wouldn't have ever married them. Anyway, we decided that both of us would like seven children. That's what we thought we would like. And, of course, when we married, nothing, nothing, nothing. In the fifth year, we were told that we were going to have a baby and the whole world was rejoicing with us. Oh, my goodness sakes. And we were so thrilled. However, the ending of the story was that our Stephen was stillborn and I had no idea when I delivered him that they would not ever let me see him or touch him, because they said his skin had become dark about the long time I had carried him dead within me. Oh my, my dear husband Del said we are going to trust in the Lord and we're not going to ask why. And we never did that.
Ann Tolly:Following week after that, my pastor came and said Ann, I need a woman to go with me to the hospitals and other things. You know that I'm traveling with and working with and I'd like a woman there with me. And would you go? And I said yes. So right away I got going in there and it was like three years later and there was nothing, no pregnancies. So our doctor said maybe you should start adoption. So we got to the home visit and guess what? I became pregnant with my first daughter in the eight years of our marriage and we just rejoiced. And then we had another child and then I had a miscarriage and I had another child and I had five living children and two with the Lord. That's what I always tell people when they ask me how many children I have.
Christa Potratz:So you had your seven.
Ann Tolly:He's had our seven. Yes, yes, yes, but it was 40 years ago last year that we celebrated down here in Michigan, in the Detroit area, the Pregnancy Counseling Center which had started. And at that time Del and I were one of the five couples that had heard about Missouri Synod having these pregnancy counseling centers. So we thought, well, we can do this. We all said that we would support it financially in whatever way we had to go. So that's how we got that started. We met at a church area and got the word out to all the churches what we wanted to do and said would you please come to this meeting and just let us tell you what we're finding, you know? So that evening of the first gathering, there were so many people that came, which was a thrill to know that there were people out there that wanted to do this work. And we showed the scream, silent scream. I don't know if you remember that one, but I'll never forget it. Well, it touched the hearts of many, and especially me, because I was not prepared, for in the middle of the film they showed the aborted baby. Now, when I had my stillbirth, they didn't call it stillbirth, they called it aborted. Okay, so remember that Now I'm sitting there watching it. And then this comes, this picture of the aborted baby. And this darkened baby was the first time that I truly felt that I'd seen my son. It was just like oh, and I ran out of the room because it just hit me.
Ann Tolly:But at the next meeting we came forth and now it was the time of commitment. You came and are you going to connect yourself now, serving the Lord and doing these works? So tell us what you want to do. And many people came up to me and said oh Ann, you'd be a good counselor. And my answer was no. And then, on the way home the meeting, my dear Del said why would I not become a counselor? He said the Lord's given you those gifts. So he said I want you to pray about it. Will you pray about it? And I said the Lord's given you those gifts. So he said I want you to pray about it. Will you pray about it? And I said yes.
Ann Tolly:Now the next day I was all alone in the house and I was walking down the hallway, turned the corner to go in our bedroom and I was talking out loud to the Lord. And this is what I said to him. Well, dear Lord, my dear Del said I should talk to you about this. And so I'm here and I want to know why you think I should be a counselor. And now, I kid you, not immediately, immediately, as I walked one step in, I heard him say because you know the death of a child. Then I knew what the Lord had done. I don't know if I would have ever done that without having the death of a child, because I became the post-abortion counselor. I thanked the Lord for showing me this wonderful reason. Anyway, that was really good.
Ann Tolly:So I called Dell and told them and, of course, the rest is history, because for 25 years I served the Lord being a regular counselor, and then they sent me into Chicago to be trained to be a post-abortion counselor. I was sitting in this big room, just a big, huge circle, and the one who was directing it said and now it's time, everybody I want everybody to tell about their abortions. And so it came to me and I said well, I never had an abortion. And the people were saying what, why are you here? Were saying what, why are you here? And I said well, I just felt that I wanted to help the women who have had abortions. And I said and I had to find out more about this. And so they accepted me warmly and that's how I started becoming a post-abortion counselor and I've never regretted it.
Ann Tolly:The journey for the center was wonderful. I got a call one day from Linda Smirk you might remember her, she was one of the real leading ones and she said Ann, I want you to get in the car and drive down Six Mile and look for the dentist office. So I got in the car and went down. She didn't tell me she wanted me to seat myself. It was three doors down from a very active abortion clinic. Well, this doctor, he wanted us there and he gave us the rental. He never once changed it in all those years until they moved away.
Ann Tolly:So we were all educated and became a volunteer counselor and we were not just there for the worldly things, giving them the diapers and the furniture and all that stuff, but we were there for spiritual help.
Ann Tolly:And that's where these wonderful pastoral counselors came in and we learned not to use the word God but Lord, because we were going to be having lots of different religions walk in our door and they said they're God, but we call them our Lord. So that was kind of interesting. Anyway, one day I was on duty and I received a phone call from a newspaper asking about our center, and one question that stands out in that is today is, they asked me well, what would you say in just a few short words about your work there? Well, the Holy Spirit had the answer I gave saving lives for now and eternity. And that became our quote. We all have that same answer in our daily walk with our Lord every day. Today we are saving lives for now and eternity when we take the time to reach out to people we don't know or you see somebody crying and you go up and tell them about Jesus.
Christa Potratz:So, as you said, you were a counselor. Can you expand a little bit on what that role is? You said you did two different types one to women who had chosen life and then, later on, to women who had gone through abortion.
Ann Tolly:That's right.
Christa Potratz:So I'm guessing these are these one-on-one conversations that you're having with women, just so that our listeners can kind of get an idea of what a counselor in those roles does yes, in those roles does.
Ann Tolly:Yes, our first ones, that we started out. Of course, we were only one-on-one and we took down all the information, personal information, and we asked them if they had any church they went to, which gave us the opportunity then to remember how to witness to them, and it was just really wanting to get to know them and who they were. And I'll tell you, when it first all started, boy, we were very nervous but excited. It was just like what are we going to say? What are they going to say? And running the pregnancy test and then letting them in there alone, waiting for that test to be shown to them, which we did all the time. Many of them wanted to take it home with them because it was their first baby, but we always, always, were told to witness to them, and that was, to me, one of the real good reasons for getting to know them.
Bob Fleischmann:And in those early years, what was like the most frustrating thing you experienced, what was the biggest hassle you felt in trying to do this work?
Ann Tolly:I would say some of my clients that were, I think, the one I can still remember. She came in and the door of the counseling room was open and there sat my pastor's wife as the one out the window and she came. This woman came in and she's sitting quite close to me and she reaches out before I begin anything and she hits my nose with her finger and she says I don't want to have you tell me anything about God or anything, the Bible, and I started to cry. I mean, I didn't know I was going to do this, but I started to cry. I said but I have to. And she says well, you're so good, you don't sin. And right away Satan came and said go ahead and tell her your sins and lose out there. Your pastor's wife can hear you, so you go ahead. And I started. I actually told her my sins, that I could remember, and she stopped me and she said you really are a sinner. I said, yes, I am a sinner, and so, anyway, she had said she didn't want to hear anything about the Bible. But when we were through I said so, you don't own a Bible. She said no, and I said well, would you like one? And she said yes, several weeks later she came in and she wanted some for her siblings. So that was one of my hard ones.
Ann Tolly:I think the other hard one was a woman came in and she was certainly not a childbearing year, she was older. Her daughter had sent her in Apparently. Her daughter had heard about us, about our post-abortion counseling, and she came in. She said well, I'm here because my daughter sent me. And she said my daughter said that I needed to come here.
Ann Tolly:The woman told me that she'd had one abortion. That's what she told her daughter. But she said actually I've had six abortions, she said, and my husband and I agreed on them together because we were married and we had a lot of children and we didn't want anymore. So we just kept aborting them. She said it was a mistake and I stopped her. I said no, it was a sin, those were sins. No, they were mistakes. I said but she wanted to join my class, said, but she wanted to join my class, you know so, my Bible class. So I invited her to come and every week she'd say she'd really emphasize the mistake and I would say you know, we're not going to go any further until you can say and believe and know that this was a sin.
Ann Tolly:Well, one night she came in and she looked ahead in our Bible study book and she read about David being confronted by Nathan. The first step in the door. I was waiting for her. She came over me and put her hands. I mean she said, I am a sinner. I am a sinner, I confess it. I said what made you change your mind? And she told me that she was reading scripture. So the Lord changed her mind. So that was a challenge. I don't think everybody had that kind of a challenge, but those were two big challenges for me.
Bob Fleischmann:A lot of people heard me talk in the past about New Beginnings Home for Mothers and there were two women who were very instrumental in gelling the idea behind New Beginnings. One was the religion editor for the old Milwaukee Journal when she kind of challenged me by saying, well, you talk a woman out of an abortion but you don't do anything to help them. And I said, well, that's not true. But I kept thinking there was more to do. And then about an hour or two later, and you might remember the conversation, you called me.
Bob Fleischmann:This would be 1991 or so 1992. You called me and you were crying because you had had a client whose boyfriend wanted her to have an abortion. You met with her, you talked with her and she went back home, told her boyfriend she didn't want to have an abortion and the man beat her and put her in the hospital. You felt terrible and you called me just to kind of comfort you. We talked and I remember after we hung up, because I remember distinctly you saying do all this great work here in the center, but they still have to go back, they have to go back to their home environment and everything. And I combined my conversation with the religion editor with my conversation with Ann, and that's where the idea for New Beginnings came from.
Ann Tolly:Oh, my goodness. But that is a wonderful opportunity, oh my.
Christa Potratz:Yeah, and you know, I think too it just really speaks to when you really get to know people, which is something that you got to do in your counseling role too is then you can really find out what people need. And kind of to Bob's point too, like what we can do about it, because I think so many people want to know what do I do? What do I do? And until you really sit down and talk with people, you may not really know how to help them.
Ann Tolly:But we did have the support from Bob a% and that wasn't probably my first phone call to him or my last. You know, he was always there, guiding us with the word. That's what we needed to hear. That's what we needed to hear. Everybody needed to hear it, you know.
Bob Fleischmann:Well, ann was the one during one of my low times and you have a few low times over these years and in one of my low times, ann, I still remember Ann saying to me remember, you are the arrow, you point the direction, and I always say yeah, and I've never forgotten that and that kind of snapped me out of my funk.
Bob Fleischmann:But it's important to remember that Now before we think that Ann is always so nice. I do very much remember getting very close to one time being thrown into a swimming pool by Ann and her fellow counselors, and then another time when I almost had a cherry pie in my face. So she was. She could be an instigator.
Christa Potratz:Oh, I don't believe you so sweet.
Ann Tolly:Oh yeah, I was the one that suggested we throw them in the pool at the Beast Coast pool.
Christa Potratz:And can you share with us some positive stories, too, that you've had over the years with people?
Ann Tolly:You know, positive, I would say, really is when I was called in at one of the conferences there. We always went out, you know, for the conferences.
Ann Tolly:For our national conferences yeah, national conferences. Right, del was on the board and he told me that Pastor Bob Fleischman wanted to see me and he said we were walking down there. And he said do you think you did something wrong in your counseling? And I said, well, I guess I'll find out. So I got in there and then he was telling us about the doors to Ukraine had opened and that they would like very much if I would go with Brad Mattis, which I didn't know him at the time, and I said I will go if my husband said you know? He said he would let me go, be blessed and he said yes, so I went and helped.
Christa Potratz:And how long were you there in Ukraine and what did you do?
Ann Tolly:You know, I don't know how many we went twice. We went one year and then the next year and we went to schools here in America. They wouldn't let us into schools In Ukraine. They opened the doors and we went to classroom after classroom. We went into colleges and the colleges another college found out what we were doing and they said we want you in our college. Well, I said we were going back to America the next day. Well, you have to come back. But anyway, those were opportunities that, you know, I never would have dreamt having, because here in America, you know, they just wouldn't do. But there were a lot of other things that the Lord had in mind for us in Ukraine.
Ann Tolly:It was, I think, the second time there that the outgoing president of Ukraine was two or three doors down at the hotel from me. That would never happen in America. So I told my translator. He said you're going to have authority on this floor, here and everything. And I said, well, I'm going to meet him. Oh, and he laughed at me. He said, no, you're not. And I said, yes, I am. So he worked with me to get the pronunciation of them.
Ann Tolly:So the next morning I stepped out across the doorway and waited for my translator. He no sooner did. He says don't move. And I said what's wrong? He says he's coming, the president's coming.
Ann Tolly:I just stood there and he stopped and he came forward out of his security. People came over and he reached for my hand and kissed my hand and he said who are you and what are you doing in my country? And while he asked wow, what an opportunity. So I told him I said well, we're here to tell your people about the development of the unborn baby and we're going to tell them all about abortion, what it does to the person that has the abortion, and this is why we're here in your beautiful country, ukraine. And I said when you're killing these babies, that means that you're killing people that would vote for you babies, that means that you're killing people that would vote for you.
Ann Tolly:So that kind of ended my discussion with him and I asked him if I could give him a gift, and he told his people of authority around him protecting him. You know that it was okay for me to go back in the room and I got him one of those real pretty bulbs that were given out with declaring Jesus' birthday, you know, and he thanked me. Well then he went down to Brad and Brad gave him one of those little pins with the feet and he said he was very interested and he said I will wear it and tell others. Now we don't know if he did or not, we don't know that, but those were the very important things in Ukraine and I understand that their centers are still going on there. That was really wonderful to hear.
Bob Fleischmann:We ended up growing it to five. We had five centers in Ukraine. We were helping Fossafaith with their mobile medical and dental unit and while we were there, Ann did some training and so forth and we got five centers going, Like you said. I think some of them are still going. I mean, we turned it back over to Thoughts of Faith and they're not in that information loop.
Bob Fleischmann:But yeah, ann, I still remember asking Ann to go to Ukraine. Ann didn't only do that for us, I think. We sent you to California, we sent you to other places in the United States to do training and it was funny because Ann was so good at this that she almost was too good, because you watch her and you go. I don't think I could do it like she does, but you really were good, thank you, that was the Lord, I was just His instrument. Thank, you.
Ann Tolly:That was the Lord. I was just His instrument. I really want to make that clear. I was just simply His instrument. He gets all the glory.
Christa Potratz:And I wanted to ask you, too, a question. You had also talked about your work talking to women after they had had an abortion, doing that type of counseling. What, maybe, was one of your biggest takeaways from doing that? Nowadays, too, we hear all sorts of things. We hear how so many people don't regret their abortion, or people that do, or oh, there's nothing really that wrong about it. So what did you find, actually, with talking to the women?
Ann Tolly:They were very suicidal. It seemed to be that I got the suicide calls when I was on hotline, which I wasn't every night, but I got really hard calls, really hard calls for suicide, really hard calls, really hard calls for suicide. The one particular one had a father who was a Lutheran day school teacher at the time and she just didn't want him to ever know what she had done and she was going to commit suicide that night. Well, I think I was on the phone two hours at least with her and I just asked her. I asked the Lord. I said well, lord, you're going to have to really help me. This is a tough one. And he let me to use the catechism, which was you know. I just couldn't believe it. But I asked all these questions out of the catechism and she responded so it must have been. The Lord, of course, knew her and knew that she knew the catechism because of her father being a teacher. He probably discussed all these things with her too. But at the end she promised me she would not commit suicide and I drove north a couple hours from the center to meet her at a restaurant.
Ann Tolly:I told her what clothes I was going to wear and what I kind of looked like. And so I drove up there and I said I'm just going to stand by the door and wait. And I said you see me, you can come and get me. And I stood and waited and waited and I just, if you see me, you can come and get me. And I stood and waited and waited and I just had the fear of that. Oh no, but then she, this woman, young woman, came up and she said are you Ann? I said yes, so we got. We asked for a booth. That was way away, because she didn't want anyone to hear what she was going to tell me, you know, and but that was a real hard one, I think. The other one was one that I never, ever did meet for a long time. She told me a story and she said no one's going to believe me. And I said well, I'm going to believe you. I said I believe whatever you're going to tell me. And she had had an abortion and she went out in the woods with her car and blocked it up so all the gas fumes would be inside, and she said now she said I was sitting in there waiting to die. Outside the car, she said, and there were demons. They were terrible, terrifying demons. They were just like screaming at me and she said, inside my car it was white, bright, and I knew they were the angels of the Lord and they were there to protect me. She said they were fighting those demons. I got out of the car and took out the stuff and went home and then she called me and then I met her a long time afterwards and we're still friends and we still talk.
Ann Tolly:But the memories of the center, oh, my goodness, I'll never forget it. There was a creaking, old, rusty sign and it was right before the driveway. I don't know if you remember that, bob, that was an old, rusty one. It says total protection and it was often. We gave that direction. Well, you come to total protection and then you turn in there and we're in with the dentist. Well, that sign eventually fell down. But I'll tell you, but the wonder of it all, god's total protection continued us there year after year after year. So that is a wonderful memory for me too.
Christa Potratz:And what would you tell someone who maybe wants to start volunteering or getting involved in counseling, in pro-life work? What would you share with them?
Ann Tolly:Well, I would say, first of all, to truly know that you're a sinner too, you have to know the Lord, you have to know the Lord's word and believe it. There's so many many wonderful blessings that come forth by talking to these people and seeing them, and you know, I have at least eight of my post-abortion people that have traveled here to where I live to see us and meet my dear Lowell too, and we correspond too, and we correspond. It's just wonderful. So you get so much more than you give. That's what I always felt. I have to remember one of my very special men. Oh, I'll never forget him, and he may even hear this podcast, and he would be so thankful if I told this story. But he had abortions with several of his girlfriends. Then he married one of the girls and guess what? They had a baby and all of this was realistic. Now what? It was a real baby, and it drove him to drugs and alcohol and everything. One night he was going to go down to the river he was telling me this and he had a gun and he went out and this man came up out of nowhere and said to him when are you going? He said I'm just going down to the river. What are you going to do there? Well, I'm just going down to the river. What are you going to do there? Well, I'm just going down there. He said well then you don't need the gun. He said give me your gun. And he said I gave him the gun. And he said later I knew that was an angel. An angel had come to stop me from killing myself.
Ann Tolly:And he came to my classes and it was through Brad Mattis's putting out signs about men, because I think Brad was one of the first ones that were really getting men into counseling really do. And he called brad and he's, and brad said uh, well, where are you located? He said in michigan, in the detroit area. And he said well then he said I have someone I want you to see and it's a woman, but don't worry, uh, she'd be like a grandmother to you. She's that she's older than you.
Ann Tolly:So he came and that night he called and I went over to the center. It was night, but I told Del, my husband. I said well, I'm going to be meeting this man tonight. So I get out of the car and I see this big, curly truck driver and he says are you Ann? I said yes, I am.
Ann Tolly:He said are you alone? I said no, I'm not alone. Well, he said well, who's with you? And I said the Lord. He said does your husband know you're here with me? And I said yes, he does. I said I don't have any fear. I said I know why you're here and I'm going to help you. So we became really good friends in Athabiri and I'll never forget it because I had no one ever probably I'll cry telling you this. But he said when we get to heaven, he said is it okay that I'm going to come and hug you? Because I told him I was a hugger, you know. And he said I'm going to come over and hug you. And he says I just want to tell you that I'm here because you were the one that invited me here.
Bob Fleischmann:Wow, Well, ann, there probably is no one in the history of our organization that has probably had tentacles of love and concern that have spread so far out. I mean, you've been a profound anchor for my life and for the work we do and, like I said, I give you part of the credit for New Beginnings. Well, I didn't even know that. You're just an incredible blessing, and the incredible part of it all is that you still are. I mean, through this podcast and I think through people who contact you, you'll continue. What you've always seen and what I've taken to heart is a lifelong legacy of thinking of others ahead of yourself and always, even in your light, pointing to the Lord.
Christa Potratz:We just thank you so much for everything that you've done throughout your career and life in this work, but also for sharing it with us today too. So thank you so much.
Ann Tolly:This was a walk down memory lane, exactly what Bob said. No one has ever asked me about that, and I treasured this. I really did.
Christa Potratz:Well, thank you so much, Anne, for sharing all of this with us today. We really appreciate it. I would thank everyone for joining us today and we'll see you back next time. Bye-bye.
Paul Snamiska:Thank you for joining us for this episode of the Life Challenges podcast from Christian Life Resources. Please consider subscribing to this podcast, giving us a review wherever you access it and sharing it with friends. We're sure you have questions on today's topic or other life issues. Our goal is to help you through these tough topics and we want you to know we're here to help. You can submit your questions, as well as comments or suggestions for future episodes, at lifechallengesus or email us at podcast at christianliferesourcescom. In addition to the podcasts, we include other valuable information at lifechallengesus, so be sure to check it out. For more about our parent organization, please visit christianliferesourcescom. May God give you wisdom, love, strength and peace in Christ for every life challenge, every Life Challenge.
