Vilna Gaon’s Descendant Reconnects at Chabad

As a result of the numerous Sedarim organized by Chabad of Central Africa, based in Kinshasa, the Congo, and directed by Head Shliach to Central Africa Rabbi Shlomo Bentolila, many souls are often touched.

Here is a glimpse of what happened this year on the second night of Pesach in the far distant city of Kigali in Rwanda:

Francis Gords has been working in Rwanda for a few decades.

He was brought up in an atheist Jewish family, and the only remnant of Judaism from his youth, was his grandfather telling him that they are descended from the Gaon of Vilna.

He heard about the Seder of Chabad in Rwanda through a pilot that, by Divine Providence, had met his daughter on a trip.

It was his first Seder in his entire life and first encounter with Judaism.

During the Seder, Gords listened to the two Chabad Yeshiva students sent to conduct the Seder, Rabbis Bentzion Duchman and Mendel Brawer, expound on the Exodus. Gords cried as he learned more and more about his roots.

On Chol Hamo’ed, the bochurim went to his house to put up mezuzos.

“It was a very moving experience,” the bochurim told COLlive. “We put him in touch with Rabbi Shlomo Bentolila to keep the contact and flame going,” they said.