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Hillsborough Judge Resigns To Become Missionary

Former Hillsborough County Circuit Judge Monica Sierra, who just left the bench to pursue ministry fulltime in the Middle East, baptizes a Palestinian refugee in the River Jordan in January 2008.

Photo courtesy of Living Bread International Church

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By MICHELLE BEARDEN | The Tampa Tribune

Published: February 1, 2008

TAMPA - She is a daughter of Tampa society, blessed with a close-knit, affluent family that took cross-country vacations in Edwardian vintage cars. Her dad was crowned El Rey XXVII of the Knights of Sant' Yago. She graduated from one of the Bay area's most respected Catholic high schools, the Academy of Holy Names.

When the Florida Legislature created a new judicial seat in Hillsborough County, friends and family fanned out across the county, knocking on doors and raising more than $100,000 for her campaign. They helped the 35-year-old lawyer become the youngest judge ever elected to Hillsborough County's circuit court.

So when Monica Sierra announced last week that she was giving it all up — the $145,000-a-year job, the comfortable safety net of family, the Mercedes-Benz — many were aghast. It wasn't just what she was throwing away, it was what she was throwing it away for: evangelical and humanitarian work in the Middle East.

The decision, she admits, caught even her by surprise.

It's still so painful for her family, they can't talk about it.

"I'm just listening to God's call," said Sierra, 41, in a phone interview from Jerusalem. "This isn't anything I planned or ever dreamed of doing. In fact, I used to pray that God would never ask me to serve in a foreign mission."

On Friday, Sierra officially resigned from the bench — one year short of completing the term she began in 2003. The Judicial Nominating Commission will take applications for her replacement, with the governor making the final selection for the vacancy.

Sierra now will redirect the passion she once put into presiding over family law and dependency cases.

In November, she announced a three-month unpaid leave of absence to volunteer with Living Bread International Church mission, a faith-based organization that provides humanitarian aid and spiritual outreach in Middle East refugee camps. She learned that wasn't nearly enough time.

As difficult as it was to walk away from her obligation to fulfill her term, Sierra said the call to remain as a full-time volunteer with the church and help expand its relief efforts outweighed everything else.

She said she had no choice but "obedience to his direction." She sees the mission's work as an antidote to terrorism and the helplessness felt by the poverty-stricken people in the camps.

"The significant work that God is doing through Living Bread cannot be overstated," she said. "I have seen miraculous transformation in the lives of refugees in the short time I've been in this land."

With no more steady income, she will rely on supporters of the mission and her personal savings.

"I have to trust that the Lord knows better than I do," she said. "My greatest trust is that the Lord will not call me to a task without equipping me with all I will need to accomplish it."

She admits the adjustment isn't easy. The child of a three-generation Tampa family, she is far from home, living in the West Bank city of Jericho, where the main languages are Hebrew and Arabic. She speaks neither. Here in Tampa, she lived in a comfortable South Tampa home, drank coffee in SoHo's Starbucks, worked out with a personal trainer at Designing Bodies.

Now she sleeps in a dormitory-style room in a house owned by the mission. She doesn't have a car and walks or takes cabs to appointments. When she's not fasting, she lives on a Bible-based diet of mainly fresh fruits and vegetables. She misses the independence she took for granted as a single person with no children, free to go out when and where she wanted.

These days, living in a volatile part of the world and working under strict security supervision, she has to take more precautions.

"I don't leave the house without spending the morning in prayer with the Lord to obtain his direction over my day's activities," she said.

She also misses her parents, her grandmother, her two older brothers. She is particularly close to her father, Michael Sierra, her law partner for nine years before she became a judge. Family members declined to be interviewed about Sierra's announcement to resign her judicial office and stay in the Middle East to serve the mission.

She acknowledged it has taken a great toll on them. They put a lot of hours into getting her elected.
"The most difficult part of this decision has been its impact on my family," she said. "Yet, their assurance of continued love for me remains a great comfort."

She's already trying to figure out how to get home in late spring, when two of her nieces graduate from Catholic grade school. Family ties are powerful, even as she pursues her spiritual life.

"She's always had a real concern and heart for people," said Monsignor Laurence Higgins, pastor emeritus of St. Lawrence Parish, where Sierra attended elementary school. "What she is doing is magnificent. What she is doing is God's work."

Higgins said he doesn't discount the danger of bringing Bibles and aid to an area prone to bombings and shootings. "I say that, and I come from Northern Ireland," he said. "It takes a tremendous amount of courage to do what she's doing. I know she put a lot of thought into this and made the decision to put it into God's hands."

Raised Catholic, Sierra said she began a yearlong Bible study 11 years ago. It focused on the first book, the Book of Genesis. That study revealed the "atoning sacrifice" made by Jesus, she said, and forged her personal relationship with Christ. From then on, her Christian journey became more evangelical.

At the courthouse, she made herself available for prayer or intercession. She never felt she was overstepping her boundaries; many judges, bailiffs, clerks and court staff requested she pray for them, she said.

"There are thousands of Christians dying all over the world for the right to study and worship God," Sierra said. "We have certain religious freedoms in America, and I have been blessed to walk in those privileges."

She first learned of Living Bread when its founder, Karen Dunham, came to speak a year ago at Sierra's church, Bayshore United Methodist. She was so moved by Dunham's presentation that she made two trips to the region to witness the mission's work firsthand. On her third trip, she realized this is where she needed to be.

Alex Kavouklis, a South Tampa mother of five, went to Israel with three of her children in January to volunteer with the mission. She saw Sierra in action, and she has no doubt that the former judge is in the right place.

"Watching her work alongside Karen was just powerful and beautiful," Kavouklis said. "It's her purpose. She was made for it."

Although not common, judges do leave the bench from time to time. But abandoning a seat for ministry before the term is up is unusual, said Charlie Rose, a professor of law at Stetson University College of Law in St. Petersburg and director of the school's Center for Excellence in Advocacy.

"It's a position of authority and power," he said. "When people reach that pinnacle, it's not easy to walk away. She's a brave person."

He knows of one other case: The dean of his law school, Notre Dame, left his job and became a monk.

Rose said Sierra's decision is a jolt to some people, who have a hard time reconciling that public figures also have a spiritual life. Although Sierra may be criticized for not fulfilling her term, he doesn't see it that way. He finds it commendable that a person with all that education, training and understanding has the courage to choose another path, regardless of the timing.

"Sometimes, you hear a voice, and you decide whether or not you're going to hear it," Rose said.

Reporter Michelle Bearden can be reached at (813) 259-7613 or mbearden@tampatrib.com.

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