Aline’s father was Frederick Edmund Bonzel, a merchant, and one of the wealthiest citizens of Olpe. Her mother was Maria Anna, surnamed Liese. The families of both the father and the mother were of long-resident stock. Documentary evidence shows the Bonzel family was established in Olpe in 1625. Even at that time a family possessed great wealth. The Liese family settled in Olpe in mid-sixteenth century according to authentic records. After Aline a second daughter, Emilie, was born to the family. She later married Dr. Lorenz Kaufmann of Olpe.
Not only because of their wealth were the Bonzels highly respected in Olpe. Their excellent reputation was due in large measure to Aline’s paternal grandfather, Franz Joseph Bonzel. That he was commander of the militia and also town councilor shows the great confidence the citizens placed in him. Only a man of great integrity, with ample evidence that his power would be used for the welfare of the people, could have been chosen for such offices. Born in 1783, during his later years he experienced turbulent times caused by the French domination and the Wars of Liberation. He had many good opportunities for using his great influence for the good of his fatherland and the benefit of the citizens. Possessing an energetic spirit of enterprise, he founded a new rolling mill at the beginning of the industrialization of the Sauerland. From this industry came the great wealth of the Bonzel family. From the first marriage of the grandfather to Maria Wilhelmine Gummerbach three sons were born, Arnold, Xavier (who died in childhood), and Edmund, Aline’s father, who was born in 1808. In his second marriage to Maria Josepha Liese, he was further blessed with four sons and five daughters.
To characterize adequately the family into which Aline was born, one must give consideration to Arnold, her paternal uncle. It is important that a family leave economic status and security to the oncoming generation, but of greater importance is its spiritual legacy. A righteous family pride centered in Arnold because of his great spirituality, for the Bonzel family considered it a matter of honor to remain true to the ideals of its forefathers. Although Arnold did not enter a religious order, he worked in his surroundings as a religious in secular garb. Nearly all of his chief traits of character are found again in essence in his niece Aline.
Uncle Arnold was in very good financial circumstances, but he was not concerned in keeping a close watch over his possessions. The word of God, “Give to the poor” (Mt 19:21), he fulfilled with great liberality. Since he remained unmarried, he was under no obligation to lay money aside. He did not exercise his generosity as many another man of wealth, who holds himself at a distance and supports charitable projects of others with money. Arnold assisted personally in cases of emergency. It happened at one time as he was making a pilgrimage, he met two unhappy and weeping children abandoned by their parents. He took them with him, provided for their keeping, and cared for their future. Whether or not this happened on the pilgrimage to Werl is not known. Uncle Arnold made the pilgrimage to Werl fifty times; still he did not disregard the smaller shrines in his vicinity.
An outstanding trait of his piety was his extraordinary love and veneration for the Holy Eucharist. To accompany the Blessed Sacrament in solemn procession only on the feast of Corpus Christi was not enough for him. Every Thursday evening for the entire year he prayerfully retraced the Corpus Christi procession route. It was his method of keeping the Thursday Holy Hour. A simple, homelike, and devout piety has its own norm which is not easily influenced by a general although legitimate norm, and above all, not by a rigid one. The Eucharistic piety of Arnold had special consideration for the house of God. Whatever was needed for decoration or otherwise he supplied from his own means. It is no wonder that the sacristan maintained a good friendship with such a generous helper. The Poor Souls held a special place in his heart. Even in the last days of his life, he collected money in their behalf for Mass stipends. Up to his last day, bowed with age, he took his customary walks, in his right hand a supporting cane, in his left hand a rosary. He was no longer interested in events occurring about him. He no longer cared. He prayed.
To withhold nothing from the poor and the ornamentation of the church, he saved on his own clothing. Often and justly so, his relatives severely reproached him and tried to persuade him to buy new clothes for himself. Serene as he otherwise was, he became quite angry with them for their prodigality in the use of money. That it was not stinginess of age, but his personal unpretentiousness is proved by his otherwise exceptionally great meekness. Although not formulated in the following manner, he lived according to the principle: One should give with warm hands what otherwise would fall from cold hands. When he died in 1879, his entire wealth had been expended for the poor. In his death he was serene and resigned. His last words were: “Praised be Jesus Christ forever and ever. Amen.” His eyes then closed in death.
Since Aline’s father died in 1837 before he was thirty years of age, her eyes turned toward her Uncle Arnold in a special way. In the fullest sense, he was the only surviving brother of her father; the others were only half-brothers. Perhaps the daughter sought in this uncle the image of her deceased father. It is singular that the chief characteristics of the uncle found expression in her life also; love of the poor and orphans, deep veneration for the Holy Eucharist, a personal unpretentious modesty, and a firmness to follow with implicit fidelity a way of life considered as right without permitting any interference from others.
Since she lost her father at the age of seven, her memories of him were not especially clear. The mother who pursued the development of her eldest daughter, wielded the greater influence in her life. Mother Maria Theresia writing the following letter to one of her sisters seems to have been reminded of the death of her own father:
I have received your letters telling us of the death of your good father. You have the Sisters’ and my deepest sympathy. We shall pray with you, dear Sister Viridiana, that our dear Lord may grant eternal rest to his beloved soul soon. Offer the next six weeks for your dear father. Since you can no longer meet him in life, may his blessings rest upon you from above. The loss of parents is always a great sacrifice and tears flow justly. Still through our total surrender to God we have detached our hearts and thus — as brides of Christ — we can through prayer be of greater assistance to our loved ones. (III 22)
In these lines definite reference is made to detachment of heart and total surrender to God. The meaning here is entirely different from that of a cold turning away from our relatives. In certain religious communities there are directives of piety which understand surrender to God as a radical thrusting aside of parents, brothers, and sisters. The foundress of the Olpe Franciscans was never in harmony with this idea. Her Sisters should attend their own parents in serious illness and endeavor to be with them at the hour of death. She considered that God himself implanted the love of parents in the hearts of children. The grief of a child over the loss of a father was sacred to her. But she also realized that a religious in this grief, when everything reminded her of the love and warmth of her own parental home, must remain true to her total surrender to God. For her, grief at the death of parents may not become an occasion for a flight back into the past. In a situation of this nature, the dedicated bride of Christ can, through faithful perseverance on the way of love, obtain ever greater graces for her dear ones.
Such beautiful adjustment God grants to a Sister who shows such love for her parents. Certainly there exists — exteriorly — a separation, as also the married daughter must go her own way in the new unity of marriage. But the religious should not only preserve the love of parents but should know that God wishes to bless her parents in a special way through her religious vocation. Mother Maria Theresia in making it possible for her Sisters to show their love and gratitude to their parents by actually assisting them in their last illness and in death, gave clear evidence of how truly human her guidance of the Sisters was and what she herself felt toward her own parents.
In touching warmth this rings out from the letter she wrote to Sister Eustella in 1902:
The news of the bitter sufferings of your dear mother has saddened me deeply. Let me trust in God, dear Sister Eustella, and beg him fervently to alleviate her pain and grant her great patience to persevere in resignation. The consolation of having you, dear child, at her bed of suffering to care for her, I gladly permit the dear sick one and you also, that you may lighten her suffering as much as possible and support her in her