Getting Acquainted

Charlotte (Fournier) Desai  ~ Graphic Artist

We laughed; we cried, but then many of you know this about Charlotte, the empath. Charlotte Desai (deh-sEYE) is a former board member of Unity North. She has also organized the ‘Good for You’ days, and is currently doing all of the graphics for the newsletters, flyers, and any other graphics that are needed, for which we are very grateful. When she got married, she moved to Minneapolis, and so joins us virtually (when she’s not sailing for the weekend).

Charlotte grew up in a Catholic background, yet questioned everything. She said, “Hell fell apart when I had children! Looking into those innocent eyes, how could anyone like that go to hell!?” And when a church member questioned her taking communion after her divorce, she left immediately. How could anyone be unworthy? She questioned this, too. Since she was very little, she has always questioned everything and believed in choice. So when her son wanted to drop out of Catholic classes, that was not a problem. Ironically, though, both of her children went to Catholic colleges. Although they don’t attend Unity with her, they do tease her about her “stuff”; yet, they do support her in all her beliefs. Her son calls Unity her “Avatar Church,” perhaps because the movie speaks of one spirit and the sacredness of life on our planet, as Unity teaches.  

One day in 2007 or 2008 Charlotte read Conversations with God by Neale Donald Walsch. All of her questions about God were answered. Since her mother, although a devout Catholic, had encouraged her questioning, she gave the book to her mother. To her surprise, all of her questions about God were answered, too. This led Charlotte to Unity. She got out the telephone book and started checking out Unity churches only to discover there was one just five minutes away from where she lived—Unity North Spiritual Center. She looked up the website and looked at the available books in the bookstore. She had already read all of them. So, she attended Unity North and never looked back.

What does she like about Unity in general? Freedom to question, of course. She gravitates toward thinkers, and if you need clarification, you get it.

With so many Unity churches in the area and closer to where she lives now, why does she stay at Unity North? Because when she started to attend, she felt like she was home again. The people are thinkers and they dig. There’s no judging, no anger. She says it’s a place where she feels love. Many times she’s been pushed out of her comfort zone, and that’s Ok with her. She loves the book studies and especially the eight years of studying the Bible.

Charlotte’s husband Jay was born in the U.S. of immigrant parents. His father came from India and his mother from Poland. This tightly knit family situation has taken her to a whole new world. Her life started out as a world traveler, as she lived in Japan when she was so young she doesn’t remember it. They have visited family homes, ancestral family homes including a real-life castle, and countries across the world. Even though Jay doesn’t participate in a religious organization, he thinks like a Unity man and often had the books he needed for a Unity book study. Charlotte is happy she did marry a Unity man after all.

Besides traveling and sailing with her husband, Charlotte loves to do mosaic art work with various mediums. She’s also an independent contractor for Graphic Design. She is now quite excited for her new life chapter as a grandmother.

When asked if she had any last words, she immediately said to “Do everything from love.” She taught her children to close their eyes when they had a decision to make. What did it feel like in their tummy? The right feeling will always lead you in the right direction. As she taught her children, and as they remind her often, “Thoughts become things so choose the good one.” Unity is all about your thoughts.

Oh yes, and she wants me to remind those who know her that she’s an introvert. But then there is that saying that “I’m an introvert until I’m comfortable with you, and then I’m not.” And that’s Charlotte. She gets comfortable very easily.

Rebecca Thompson ~ Prayer Chaplain

Rebecca Thompson comes to us from Redondo Beach, California, where she is currently living. She is one of our regular attendees and a volunteer. Have you ever noticed that sometimes Rebecca isn’t on Zoom with us on Sunday mornings at Unity North? Maybe that’s because sometimes she is in another country! In fact, she had just arrived in England when this interview took place. As a Reiki Master, she was preparing to take a class in an advanced form called Holy Fire and Karuna Reiki. Other countries this world traveler has visited include Australia, Thailand, India, Scotland, Ireland, and Germany.

Rebecca has been an organizational development consultant for 30 years. She uses her training in the Meyers Briggs Personality Inventory and guided meditations in the corporate workshops she teaches. Her most recent position took her to Germany twice a year to work out of the corporate office. However, the company has decided to work exclusively out of Germany, so they laid off their top management, which included Rebecca. This has given her an opportunity to sit back and decide which direction to take her life now because she’s not ready to retire! But, don’t feel too sorry for her. She has already received several offers.

Rebecca met her former husband at Penn State. They were both engineers. She was an industrial engineer, and he was a civil engineer. After graduation, she worked at Eastman Kodak in New York for three years. Kodak started a diversity initiative, and she got involved. Through this time, she and her husband had 3 children who were raised in the Presbyterian Church, which is the church in which Rebecca was raised.

Initially, church wasn’t resonating with her. It was more of a social time. She had a lot of gay friends and didn’t feel comfortable at church. So when they moved to Raleigh, North Carolina, she attended a Unitarian church. That was more intellectual, and she was looking for something else, but not really sure what.

In 2011, she was invited to a Reiki class. Most of the people in the class were from Unity, so she started to attend Unity in downtown Raleigh and never looked back. In 2014, she took a job in California, this time making a list of the Unity and spiritual churches in the area. She started to visit them, and one visit just happened to be Unity of South Bay. The new minister had only been there about a month, and the church itself was warm and friendly. That minister really resonated with her, so she stayed. That minister was Rev. Kathy McCall.

In the fall of 2019, Unity of South Bay closed its doors, and Rebecca reluctantly drove Rev. Kathy to the airport to fly to Minneapolis in order for Kathy to serve in Coon Rapids, Minnesota. Then the pandemic hit. Rebecca had stayed in touch with Rev. Kathy, and she found out Unity North was going virtual. So here she is once again at Rev. Kathy’s church.

Rebecca feels Unity teachings are very compelling. They focus on love and acceptance for everyone, including the self. Social justice is important, and you can be whoever you are. Rev. Kathy inspired her to attend Unity North Spiritual Center on Zoom, and she stays because it has a special warmth and is inclusive. She thinks it’s wonderful that the ministry makes an effort to include remote people in the services. For a while, Rebecca was attending both Unity North and the Raleigh Unity virtually; but the former is a little smaller and more welcoming. Even as it grows, she feels it will still maintain that special form of warmth.

Rebecca is never bored, and this is why: Besides being involved in Reiki and the Meyers Briggs Personality Inventory, she’s interested in reading and singing. She always finds a way to sing in every new community in which she lives (Karaoke, a community choral group, etc.). She has many pots of herbs inside her small apartment because she can’t get out and get her hands in the dirt to garden. Her dog Honey helps her to meet other dog-friendly people. She makes jewelry, loves crystals and rocks, swimming, hiking, nature, and dream interpretation. As a child, she was introverted, quiet and shy; she has always been in her head. She found interest in Shamanism and enjoys taking a shamanic journey because she has met animals, teachers, and spirit guides. Shamanism, which she began in 2009, has helped her with her healing process.

Some last words she would like to impart that she has gained from her Louise Hay readings are: “Each of us has so much love in our hearts that we could heal the whole world. Let’s get on with it!”

Rebecca Thompson’s book, Rebecca Rising, is an account of her spiritual journey that led to her divorce and her healing. You can find it today on Amazon.

Fionn Robertson ~ Sunday Worship Assistant (as an online volunteer)

Fionn comes to us from Sebastopol, California, which is near San Francisco in wine country. He has one brother who lives where he was raised, in Southern California. The unique spelling of his name is Gaelic, coming from a strong connection to his Scottish heritage. His doctorate in Clinical Psychology enables him to do the work he loves—working in Social Support for homeless individuals and families. He especially loves working with youth, particularly “testy” youth.

Fionn grew up in a Methodist church. He felt disconnected from the church, disconnected from himself, and this disconnection led to his becoming morbidly obese. Approximately seven years ago Fionn got tired of being tired and joined Overeaters Anonymous. The spiritual work in this program fed his long-time inner desire to know more spiritually, and so his journey towards Unity began. First he found Science of Mind, but he felt this was a little too New Age for him, and he was missing God. When Covid hit, he began reading Matthew Fox literature and attending Matthew Fox seminars and workshops. One of those workshops was hosted by Unity North. He wasn’t able to attend, so he went back and watched the recording. He attended a local Unity church but didn’t feel like he was going to church. He didn’t feel connected in any way. Later he took a class with Rev. Kathy and bought her book, The Unorthodox Life. Finally, he had found teachings with which he really connected. Unity allowed Fionn to listen and talk to God. He felt he was actually learning about God and how this was all part of being human. He calls Unity “Shining Goodness.” 

Fionn has been attending Unity North on Zoom for about four years. He feels Rev. Kathy is very dynamic and “speaks a multitude,” as he calls it. She has a widespread base of knowledge and brings everything together with the idea of God. He’s learning something. He’s learning “who I can be and how I can grow.” His spiritual growth through OA, Matthew Fox, Unity teachings, and Rev. Kathy helped Fionn to lose well over 100 pounds. He says he is ready to “become my authentic self.”

Throughout this seven-year spiritual journey, Fionn has learned to appreciate big and little things: gardening, landscaping, an in-person exercise program called Body Combat that he says is incredible (mixed martial arts with music). Before, he struggled to walk two blocks. Now he loves to hike for hours—and bend over to tie his shoes.

His downs aren’t so down because he has better skills. Every morning he tells his cat, Cocoa, that it’s going to be a good day because he knows it’s going to be a good day. He wakes up happy and hums Unity songs to himself all the time. His life goals are to do more, be more, live more spiritually, and complete the test for his clinical license. As if things couldn’t get any more positive for Fionn, he gave us two of his life lessons. 

“I know what to do—do the work and leave everything else to God.”
“Just Be”