HeartS of the House
Editor’s Note: During nearly two decades, it’s been called “Meet Our Volunteers,” “Unity’s Shooting Stars” and, most recently, “Heart of the House.” With this issue, and Intermittently in the future, the column will pluralize its title, recalling, via evocative vignettes, congregants who have been featured through the years, observing a random order without regard to age or publication year, an interspersed collage of individuals interrelated by the choice of Unity Church of Clearwater as their spiritual home.
Around the turn of the century, Verna Case became the first honoree in “Meet Our Volunteers.” For many years, she drove almost 60 miles round trip three days a week to UCC, non-selective in her service, doing “whatever needs to be done.” With her, came Tiger, a Lhasa Apsa mix, with his little lunch bag of carrots and apples. During the summer of 2003, following the electrical fire, Verna was always here, assuming leadership and proving equal to the task as she worked endless hot hours under layers of black soot, cleaning, packing, moving that which could be salvaged. From a Sunday in 1984 when she took the wrong turn to the right church, she was totally committed to UCC, sharing her time, energy, love and loyalty. Verna transitioned this life on April 15, 2015, a week before her 85th birthday.
A former member of Unity’s Board of Directors, Dr. Regina Bennett came to UCC for the first time in the early 90s. After her long volunteer service as sponsor of Y.O.U., the teens officially delegated her as Sponsor Emeritus, and on the wall of the reception room of her chiropractic practice, she proudly displayed their framed remembrance: “For more than 20 years, you have shown us love, loyalty and spiritual balance, and we love and honor you forever.” Dr. Bennett was married with three children when she enrolled in Life University to earn her Doctor of Chiropractic degree. A firm believer and follower of the belief that power within heals, she said in a 2011 interview: “That’s why I like Unity so much. God is the power within. I just make sure bones are aligned; it is the power within in accordance with Unity principles that does the healing.”
A long time member of the welcoming committee, usher and Light Bringer, Florida native Trina Anderson was familiar with her mother’s Unity church home in the Cape Canaveral area and, in 1998, found her way to UCC. A former social worker in Louisiana, later, an agent at New York Life in Tampa, and the mother of Aric, Aron and Adrian, Trina and her sons had been coming to UCC for 18 months when 11-year-old Adrian, her youngest, while riding his bike on a Sunday afternoon, was struck by a car and killed. It was at this tragic time that the importance of Unity in her life became a marked presence, its immeasurable support fulfilling the true meaning of “The House Built on Love.” A self-described “sci-fi person,” Trina likes action and drama in movies and books, loves the orchestra and travel, only then missing Sunday services.