OBITUARY: Sister Christopher ,OSBM, educator in Ukrainian parish schools (05/01/05)

OBITUARY: Sister Christopher ,OSBM, educator in Ukrainian parish schools

FOX CHASE MANOR, Pa. - Sister Christopher Mary Bonk, OSBM, died peacefully at the Motherhouse of St. Basil the Great on April 7,

Sister Christopher was born in Wilkes-Barre, Pa., on January 15, 1915. The daughter of the late Paul and Justine Bonk, she was a parishioner at Ss. Peter and Paul Ukrainian Catholic Church in Wilkes-Barre. She entered the religious community on September 25, 1931. Ten years later, on August 24, 1941, she made her final profession.

Sister Christopher was an excellent educator and taught in many parish schools throughout the United States. Over the decades, her teaching ministry touched the lives of hundreds of children in New York, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Illinois and New Jersey. In 1995, her last year of active service in the religious community of the Sisters of St. Basil the Great, she was involved in pastoral ministry at St. Nicholas Ukrainian Catholic Church in Philadelphia.

Sister Christopher retired to the Motherhouse in 1996. Determined not to spend her retirement years with idle hands, she assisted the director and staff of the monastery's finance office.

Sister Christopher's life was celebrated at a parastas on April 11, by the Rev. James Karepin, OP, and the Rev. Edward Higgins. The Rev. Roman Pankiw joined the Revs. Karepin and Higgins at the celebration of the requiem divine liturgy on April 12. Following divine liturgy, her remains were interred at the sisters' cemetery in Fox Chase, Pa.

In her eulogy, Provincial Superior Dorothy Ann Busowski, OSBM, paid tribute to Sister Christopher's life, which had been so generously devoted to others.

Sister Christopher is preceded in death by her brother, Peter Bonk. She is survived by her sisters Anna Legieza, Tekla Bonk and Stella Bonk, several nephews and a niece.

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