By Elena Macias
In 1987, fresh out of high school, 18-year-old Gloria Huerta joined the United States Marine Corps, beginning her life in public service. Leaving to join the U.S. Marine Corps right after graduating high school unfortunately meant that Huerta could not complete her catechism classes to be confirmed in her home parish of Our Lady of Guadalupe, San Bernardino.
After serving her country for two years, during which she was unable to attend church, Huerta says she never lost her faith. As the years passed she would come to devote her life to public service and to God. That devotion was recognized at the 2023 Diocesan Blue Mass on Oct. 18 when Huerta received the Chief Patrick Crowe Award, given to a member of the public safety community who models their faith in their work.
“When I left the military, I was kind of going from job to job because I had a son, and without any higher education, I had my high school diploma and I started college, but I never finished, but the sheriff’s department really gave me a chance,” Huerta recalls.
Huerta began her journey in public service as a San Bernardino County Custody Assistant and then quickly moved up to be a Custody Specialist, which entailed assisting law enforcement in the control and supervision of prisoners within a sheriff’s detention facility. Here, Huerta exhibited her Catholic upbringing by treating the inmates with dignity, despite their standing. After serving in this position for seven years, Huerta continued her career in the Sheriff’s Department and became a Crime Prevention Specialist. In this position, she would teach self-defense classes to victims of abuse, especially to children, many of whom had been sexually abused. In the face of abused children, Huerta turned to God.
“I have taught a lot of victims of child abuse, probably more on the sexual side,” Huerta said. “We would teach them self-defense and I would always include a little bit of prayer in there and just talk to the kids about keeping safe and that God is always with them.”
Cautious of not bringing religion into a government environment, Huerta would often wait until the end of the 10-hour class to speak to the children about God.
“At the end of the class, I would always tell them if you believe in God make sure you turn to God because he’s always there and he’s always listening,” Huerta said. “I couldn’t talk too much about the Holy Spirit… but I would always make sure that there was some aspect of God in the teachings that I did, especially for children who had already been victimized… I always made sure regardless of what I was teaching, whether it was in the classroom or the physical [defense] moves that I was teaching to kids, to always, always make sure that they knew they were loved by God.”
Huerta remained in this position for 16 years, until she was promoted to her current position, one of two Public Information Officers for the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department. Her work involves the dissemination of information on the activities, services, and objectives of the Sheriff’s Department to the news media and the public.
Throughout her career with the Sheriff’s Department, Huerta always knew she wanted to complete the Sacrament of Confirmation and after she met her husband, Raymond Huerta, she enrolled in the Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults (RCIA) at Our Lady of Guadalupe, San Bernardino. It was then that Huerta decided to pray the Rosary every day, which she attributes to her promotion.
“When I started to go to our RCIA, I thought, ‘I’m going to pray the Rosary at least once a week,’ and so I started doing it once a week,” Huerta said. “Then I thought, ‘No, that’s not enough, I’m going to do it daily,’ so I started doing it daily and for some reason I felt like once I did that, things that were hard to comprehend, suddenly made sense. I feel like that coupled with the sacraments just gave me so much more understanding of the faith, of the things around me… it just seemed like wonderful things started to happen. I got promoted to the position that I’m in now, my kids are doing great, I got asked to teach at the church and it just went from there and here I am interviewing for this award and I’m just kind of blown away- out of all the people, me, that’s awesome.”
Huerta was honored when Our Lady of Guadalupe Parish asked her to be the English Confirmation Coordinator and teach second-year confirmation to high school parishioners.
“It just motivates me to want to learn more because I feel like I have a responsibility to teach [and] to pass on my knowledge to them so it’s very very important to me,” Huerta said. “It has made me more aware of the things I do in my life, the good and the bad, and it has inspired me to pray even more. Prior to being asked to teach, I prayed my Rosary every day, but I started teaching and it was just so much more meaningful.”
Huerta will always be thankful to her mother for bringing her up in the Catholic Church and for always making sure she attended Mass, which gave her strength in her faith. Huerta also thanks the Sheriff’s Department for giving her a career and affording her the opportunity to raise her children.
Huerta promises to never leave either position with the Sheriff’s Department or with Our Lady of Guadalupe Parish because of her strong commitment and loyalty to both. Huerta and her husband reside in San Bernardino with their seven sons (she has three, he has four).
Elena Macias is the Managing Editor of the Inland Catholic BYTE.