From the hills of Italy to the plains of Kansas, John and Teri Bosio’s marriage vision has inspired and strengthened Catholic families for decades. The two created and led Catholic marriage enrichment programs, SIX DATES for Catholic Couples, The Beatitudes, The Virtues; and a pre-marital program, Joined By Grace; and books, Happy Together The Catholic Blueprint for a Loving Marriage, Blessed is Marriage, Six Jars of Love, and most recently, Raising a Catholic Family Today: Building a Domestic Church A Handbook for Parents.

Their publishing career happened almost by accident. As John puts it, “God didn’t leave me alone,” despite his busy corporate career. Before publishing the content that became Happy Together in 2008, the Bosios tested their thoughts by living out the principles they were proposing to others. They were married for 51 years before Teri passed in 2024.

The two met at the Catholic Church of the Holy Cross in Overland Park, a suburb of Kansas City. John had originally come to America to study English and theology with the idea of becoming a priest and missionary. When he discerned taking holy orders was not his path, the pastor at Holy Cross invited him to work as the Coordinator of Religious Education. Teri was originally one of John’s volunteers in the Holy Cross Religious Ed. program until she was hired as the parish secretary. They married after a brief but fraught separation. John’s writing about their experience in tribute to Teri in a volume tentatively titled Caught in a Spider’s Web. The book tells the story of the 97 days in the summer of 1972 when they were stuck on opposite sides of the vast Atlantic Ocean. John’s revisiting the 120 letters the couple wrote to each other to fill in the details.

John, originally an Italian citizen, had been called back to serve in the country’s military, a commitment that could have kept him in Italy for more than a year. Because he had left America while his permanent resident visa was still in process, he found that even when events unfolded to exonerate him from service, he was unable to return. The twists and turns are still fresh in his mind more than half a century later. The letters John and Teri wrote daily encouraging each other and pointing to God carried them through the uncertainty and tension.

He counts their time apart as the best marriage preparation, as they spent time pouring out their hearts in writing while making plans for the future. “It was a test, but it was a gift that strengthened our relationship,” he said.

Back in Kansas, John obtained a master’s degree in counseling, and subsequently, he and Teri worked as the Family Life Coordinators for the Diocese of Kansas City in Kansas. Later, he established a private counseling practice to serve three parishes, but after seven years realized that while he was providing a valuable service, his income was not enough to sustain his growing family. He entered the corporate world and eventually became an international human resource manager for a global company headquartered in Nashville. Teri raised their two girls and worked part-time in various roles in their local parishes.

While doing corporate work and a lot of international business travel, God kept putting the question on John’s heart – “You have all this theology and counseling experience – what are you doing with it?” Teri, always the wind beneath his wings, encouraged him to write about what he knew. John used downtime during international work travel to stay current by reading up-to-date research on marriage and Church documents and started writing monthly articles for his local diocesan paper.

His quest was to discern the qualities that contributed to a stable marriage – and not just any list – one that would prove empirically true, undergirded by the word of God.

“Every book had its own list of suggestions,” he said, “Many authors write about their experiences working with couples, but I was looking for an archetype of married love, something above everything that tied it all together. I found it in the Bible. In the Old Testament, God’s relationship with Israel is compared to a marriage.  In the New Testament, Christ is called the bridegroom, and the Church is His bride.”

“How does Christ interact today with his Church – His bride – to express His love for her and keep their marriage relationship growing?” He wondered.

John noted that what he had learned from the research published by social scientists about the attitudes and behaviors that contribute to success in marriage are the same that Christ shows for His Bride through the seven sacraments of the Catholic church.

Acceptance – In Baptism, Christ forgives us, accepts us as we are and welcomes us into his family, John said. In Marriage, successful spouses welcome each other, accept and respect one another’s uniqueness and show patience and tolerance for their differences.

Presence – At Confirmation, Christ seals us with his Holy Spirit, representing Christ’s presence in our lives. In marriage, we, too, are sealed to each other and must remain present and attentive and make each other our priority to be successful.

Sacrifice – In the Eucharist we celebrate Christ’s sacrifice for us. Marriage requires many mutual sacrifices to constantly accommodate one another.

Forgiveness – In confession, we receive forgiveness of sins. Forgiveness is essential to marriage. Without it, resentment grows and the relationship falls apart.

Healing – We all need healing. Spouses have mental, physical or spiritual stresses. In the sacrament of Anointing of the Sick, Christ heals us spiritually and comforts us. In marriage, spouses are each other’s first healers.

Service – Holy Orders and Matrimony are the sacraments through which Christ sustains his Bride, the Church. These are known as sacraments of service. In matrimony, spouses sustain their common life by serving each other in their daily needs.

The absence of any of these six qualities dooms any marriage, John said. However, Christian couples that embrace this sacramental model for their marriage have two advantages, First, Christ is their example, and second, through their participation in the sacramental life of the Church, Christ gives them the graces they need to follow his example.

Teri suggested that John incorporate stories into the material to make it more relatable, he said. He shared an example of a time they practiced forgiveness. Teri had been upset with John and went to the mall to cool off. She decided to treat herself to a cookie, but then realized she couldn’t buy one just for herself. She had to bring one home for John, too. Her gift when she returned broke the ice and opened the door for forgiveness and reconciliation, he said.

The material came together as the book, Happy Together, the Catholic Blueprint for a Loving Marriage. After it was published, John “thought I was done,” he said with a laugh. Until he received a call from the director of a large Catholic family organization who encouraged him to create a resource parishes could use to jumpstart date night programs based on the book. “They wanted videos,” John said, something he didn’t know how to produce or fund. But God made it possible through friends at church and SIX DATES for Catholic Couples was born. Subsequently used by more than 1000 parishes in the United States, Canada and Australia and translated into Spanish, the videos, handouts and prayers are available free on the happy-together.net website.

Content of SIX DATES for Catholic Couples includes:

DATE 1: ONCE UPON A TIME… invites couples to remember how their love story began and how it has a special meaning because it is connected to God’s love story.

DATE 2: MARRIAGE IS … explains what we believe about marriage as Catholics.

DATE 3: WHAT KEEPS YOU TOGETHER? suggests that it is the goodness they see in each other that keeps husband and wife together. In other words, it is the ability to see God’s image in one another.

DATE 4: WHAT ABOUT ME? addresses the problem of selfishness in marriage.

DATE 5: THE BLUEPRINT OF LOVE suggests that to overcome selfishness we need to learn to love as Christ loves.

DATE 6: WHERE DO I FIND THE COURAGE? reminds us that learning to love like Christ loves is difficult. Prayer and God’s grace can help us endure the challenges we encounter in our married life.

“God kept on pushing me,” John said. “Parishes from around the country kept calling and asking, ‘What else do you have we can use?’” Teri encouraged him to develop a book from a series of articles he had written on the Beatitudes. The Blessed is Marriage: A Guide to the Beatitudes for Catholic Couples, with an accompanying video titled, The Beatitudes, A Couple’s Path to Greater Joy were published in 2012. Since then, the book has been translated into Chinese and had a version developed for those in India. “None of this was planned,” John said.

Now John and Teri’s books and programs to help Catholic parishes support marriages have been beloved for almost 20 years. John followed the Beatitudes with a series based on the Virtues, published in 2016. The Bosios drew upon their years of mentoring couples preparing for marriage to create the Joined by Grace marriage preparation program that has since become a gold standard in the Catholic Community. Archbishop Kurtz calls it, “The Cadillac of marriage preparation programs,” John noted.

Another book, Six Jars of Love, (inspired by jars that ran out of wine at the wedding in Cana – the subject of Jesus’ first miracle) applies the same principles in Happy Together for those who John describes as “running out of love” in their marriage.

John addressed the need to develop habits that keep couples connected. Simple things like acknowledging the other’s presence by saying “good morning, good night, letting the other know if they are leaving the house.” Others include having a meal together daily, making time for each other and praying. “Once those habits of loving and caring for each other are established in the marital relationship, they are passed on organically to the children.”

The most recent offering, Raising a Catholic Family Today: Building a Domestic Church A Handbook for Parents, was published in 2023. This resource follows a natural progression to continue to provide guidance for the couples the Bosios shepherded with their programs from pre-marriage through subsequent life stages. It’s billed as a handbook for Catholic parents and grandparents on raising children in the current culture while remaining true to teachings of the Catholic church. The book is complemented by a series of six free podcasts ( https://soundcloud.com/john-bosio/sets/raising-a-catholic-family). In the audio, families discuss their challenges and share how they’ve overcome obstacles.

John describes the content as Catholic parenting .001. “These kids (from the pre-marriage class) got married, have children, and need some parenting guidance.” He expands on the courtesy and connectedness developed in Six Jars of Love to help parents teach children daily habits to sustain relationships with other people. “Home is the place children learn to love. Make sure your children feel safe in your home,” he advised. “Recognize and remember God is present there. Teach the children to pray and develop habits that nurture the soul.” He reminds families they are not islands: connect with and contribute to a faith community to find resources for themselves and to help others.

Although age 81, John’s not resting on his laurels. He’s working with his parish to create a series of parenting pointers to be sent daily to families in the parish during Lent 2025. The purpose is to encourage families to teach their children to practice the faith they received at Baptism. He’s even meeting with small groups of parents personally between Masses at his home parish, St. Stephens Catholic Community, to listen to the concerns of young parents and provide guidance.

And stay tuned for Caught in a Spider’s Web. While John’s not sure when or if he’ll make the pages public, the Bosios’ legacy love story endures.