FLASHBACK!!!
Center To Serve Needs Of Jews
By ERIC R. DANTON - The Hartford Courant - 4/2/01
GLASTONBURY - Just in time for Passover, the international Chabad-Lubavitch organization, with 4,500 institutions worldwide, has opened a center to serve Jews in eastern Connecticut.
Chabad: East of the River will focus on the spiritual and material needs of Jews from East Windsor in the north to Middletown in the south, and as far east as Colchester and Storrs, Rabbi Yosef Wolvovsky said.
While Chabad in Glastonbury plans to offer mostly social activities, holiday and Sabbath meals and adult education classes, Wolvovsky said, religious services are a possibility, too.
"If we see the need for a congregation, for a religious service per se, we'll do that," said Wolvovsky, who runs the Glastonbury center with his wife, Yehudis.
Chabad officials decided to expand east after an increasing number of residents from eastern Connecticut began attending activities and services at the West Hartford Chabad House.
"The Jewish population is moving, spreading out to communities east of the river," said Rabbi Joseph I. Gopin, regional director of Chabad of Greater Hartford.
The Glastonbury center operates independently of other area Chabad organizations, and the Wolvovskys have already started their first community outreach programs - Jewish Story Hour at area libraries and free matzo delivery for Passover.
Elisa Balaban of Colchester said she is glad to have a Chabad organization closer than West Hartford or New London, where her family had gone previously. "I think it will be good, especially for the children, to have something closer," said Balaban, whose family attended a recent Sabbath dinner in Glastonbury.
Though Chabad is essentially a Hassidic organization, Wolvovsky said Jews from all backgrounds, as well as non-Jews, are welcome to attend activities and programs.
"The most important thing is that we don't want to impose our philosophy on anyone," Wolvovsky said. "The world is everyone's world."