Rev. Monica M. Barnes is a native of Norfolk, VA and is the daughter of Barbara Morse and Edward I. Morse, II. Rev. Barnes received her secondary education at First Colonial High School in Virginia Beach where she has resided for the last 32 years. She received her undergraduate degree from Virginia Tech in Liberal Arts and Sciences with concentrations in Political Science, Sociology and Black Studies. In 2006, she graduated with a Master of Divinity degree from the Virginia University of Lynchburg.

Under her own volition, she was baptized at Mount Pleasant Baptist Church; Norfolk, VA at the age of 5 under Rev. Ben Beamer. She later was confirmed as an Episcopalian at Grace Episcopal Church; Norfolk, VA under Rev. Joseph N. Greene, Jr. where she was a member for 20 years. She returned to her Baptist roots in 2002 and joined First Baptist Church Mahan Street where she is currently the Youth Pastor.

She is married to Morris A. Barnes of Suffolk, VA and they are the proud parents of two sons, Miles Angelo Barnes and Mason Evan Barnes.

A Pledge to Rescue Our Youth

by Maya Angelou

Young women, young men of color, we add our voices

to the voices of your ancestors who speak to you over ancient seas and across impossible mountain tops.

     Come up from the gloom of national neglect, you have already been

      paid for.   Come out of the shadow of irrational prejudice, you owe

     no racial debt to history.  The blodd of our bodies and the prayers of

     our souls have bought you a future free from shame and bright beyond

     the telling of it.

We pledge ourselves and our resources to seek for you clean and well furnished schools, safe and non-threatening streets, employment which makes use of your talents, but does not degrade your dignity.

     You are the best we have.

     You are all we have.

     You are what we have become.

We pledge you our whole hearts from this day forward.