60 British Shluchim Convene

By COLlive reporter

Lubavitch U.K. held an inspiring conference this past Tuesday and Wednesday. Over 60 Shluchim, rabbis and educators from England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland gathered at the Bais Lubavitch headquarters in Stamford Hill, London.

In the wake of the Mumbai tragedies, many memorial services and events of inspiration were arranged by Lubavitch in many communities. This conference, however, was a chance for shluchim themselves to practice the concept of ‘ish es chavero ya’azoru’ and to strengthen each other’s individual shlichus.

Organized by Rabbi Pesach Efune and presided over by Head Shliach to Great Britain Rabbi Nachman Sudak, it featured workshops on education, fundraising, the growing number of campus Shluchim, coping with the challenges of small communities and how to improve our own achdus.

“The decision that everyone should attend all workshops proved to be a big success as shluchim working in various areas of hafatzah were able to learn from each other as well as contributing different perspectives,” the organizers told COLlive.

The appointment of Rabbi Bentzi Sudak to the mosad was announced and after hearing him speak it was immediately apparent that he will be”h be a great asset.

A high point of the evening was the keynote address by guest speaker Rabbi Moshe Kotlarsky, Vice Chairman of Merkos L’Inyonei Chinuch, who flew in from New York. His inspiring words focused on not allowing us to be weakened even the tiniest amount by the recent events in India.

“Such things only go to show how successful we are,” he declared unequivocally, “because when the ‘tzad shekeneged’ sees how well we are doing ‘falaigt er zich beyoiser’.”

Kotlrasky, who is working to arrange a local Kinus Hashluchim in Europe, stayed on later in the evening to farbreng with the shluchim with many interesting stories of the Rebbe. The kinus closed with a number of decisions and a feeling that the past two days had definitely been a huge success.