Joined by Grace Couple's Book

By John Bosio and Teri Bosio

The Joined by Grace Couple’s Book prepares engaged couples by sharing what the Church teaches about marriage and how the grace of the sacraments can help them build and sustain healthy and lasting marriages.

The Joined by Grace Couple’s Book:

• Integrates the riches of Catholic teaching on marriage and advice from marriage and family experts
• Provides rich reading material and simple exercises to help couples reflect more deeply on their relationship and future together
• Communicates the importance of skills such as welcoming and accepting each other, being present, giving yourself completely, forgiving, and healing, and how these skills are blessed and strengthened by the grace of the sacraments
• Includes six steps in each chapter that move engaged couples from an introduction of a theme about what the Church teaches about marriage to practical skills for successful marriages

The Couple's Book also available in Spanish.

About Joined by Grace

Joined by Grace was developed with one goal in mind: to help engaged couples build strong, life-giving, and lasting unions by inspiring them to welcome God into their marriages more completely.

Offering couples the tools they need for life after their wedding day, Joined by Grace shows how the seven sacraments can help build marriages that are rooted in Christ by teaching couples to accept and be fully present to one another, give themselves completely, and serve and forgive each other.

Published by Ave Maria Press—the publisher of Together for Life and a leader in marriage ministry for almost 50 years—written by marriage experts John and Teri Bosio, and produced by the Emmy-winning Spirit Juice Studios, Joined by Grace provides parish leaders, mentor couples, and engaged couples the most comprehensive, innovative, and up-to-date marriage preparation program for Catholic parishes today and the first to emphasize the connection between marriage and the other six sacraments.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Ave Maria Press
• Release date: Oct 14, 2016
• ISBN: 9781646800728

John Bosio

John Bosio is a former marriage and family therapist, director of religious education, and diocesan family life coordinator. He worked for 23 years in international human resources in various corporations.  He is a member of the National Association of Catholic Family Life Ministers.   He and his wife, Teri, are retired but remain active in parish and family ministry, serving parishes and dioceses around the country. The Bosios lead couples retreats and workshops on family ministry for deacons and priests. They wrote Joined by Grace, a marriage preparation program from Ave Maria Press. They produced three parish-based marriage enrichment programs: Six Dates for Catholic Couples, The Beatitudes: A Couple’s Path to Greater Joy, and  Four Dates for Catholic Couples: The Virtues.   John earned his bachelor’s degree in sacred theology from Catholic University in Washington, DC, a master’s degree in theology from St. Paul’s College, also in Washington, and a master’s in education from the University of Missouri at Kansas City. He was certified as a marriage and family therapist in 1977. He is the author of three books and a number of articles on marriage, including Why Get Married in the Church: The Lifelong Blessing of a Catholic Wedding. The Bosios live in in Nashville, Tennessee, and have two daughters and one grandchild.

Book preview

Nihil Obstat and Imprimatur:

Most Reverend David R. Choby

Bishop of Nashville

May 5, 2016

The Nihil Obstat and Imprimatur are official declarations that a book or pamphlet is free of doctrinal or moral error. No implication is contained therein that those who have granted the Nihil Obstat or Imprimatur agree with its contents, opinions, or statements expressed.

Scripture quotations are from the New Revised Standard Version of the Bible, copyright © 1993 and 1989 by the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of Churches of Christ in the USA. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

____________________________________

© 2016 by John and Teri Bosio

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever, except in the case of reprints in the context of reviews, without written permission from Ave Maria Press®, Inc., P.O. Box 428, Notre Dame, IN 46556, 1-800-282-1865.

Founded in 1865, Ave Maria Press is a ministry of the United States Province of Holy Cross.

www.avemariapress.com

Paperback: ISBN-13 978-1-59471-548-8

Cover and text design by K. H. Bonelli and Katherine J. Ross.

Printed and bound in the United States of America.

Contents

Preface

Program Overview

1. Welcoming and Accepting: The Grace and Call of Baptism

2. Being Fully Present: The Grace of Confirmation

3. Giving Oneself Completely: The Grace of the Eucharist

4. Forgiving: The Grace of Reconciliation

5. Healing: The Grace of the Anointing of the Sick

6. Serving: The Grace of Marriage and of Holy Orders

Afterword

Notes

Author Biography

Preface

Warm greetings and welcome to this important step in preparing for your marriage in the Catholic Church. Throughout the Joined by Grace program, you will be asked to share stories and examples from your life with your mentor couple, as well as other church leaders and engaged couples. You will do so in the context of either one-on-one or small-group meetings with your mentor couple or during the course of a weekend retreat. It’s good to share stories and learn from other couples about what makes a good marriage, so we begin by telling you some of our story.

We are Teri and John Bosio, the authors of this program. We were married in the Catholic Church in 1972 and have lived faithful to our wedding vows through many good times and bad times. There is hard-won wisdom that comes from long experience, and we want to share some of what we have learned with you in the expectant hope that our story will help you build a marriage that lasts a lifetime and grow a love strong enough to carry you through your own good times and bad.

Teri

We are both lifelong Catholics, but we had quite different life experiences before moving to Kansas and meeting each other there. My father was in the Air Force, and my large military family moved quite a bit and lived in many different places. I remember being thirteen, living in Bangkok, Thailand, and attending an international Catholic school when I first realized that God was calling me to one day be married. A friend and I went so far as to start praying for our future husbands, being quite aware that they were out there somewhere. Each day we would go to the chapel, kneel in front of an image of Mary, and pray. I often wondered where my future husband was and what he might be doing. I continued praying for this unknown him through high school and college.

John

Meanwhile, during my teenage years, I thought I wanted to be a priest. I was born and raised in Italy and attended a high school seminary preparing to become a missionary. I was later sent by my religious community to Washington, DC, to study theology at the Catholic University of America. There I grew less certain about my vocation and asked for a leave of absence. During my leave, I worked at Holy Cross Catholic Church in Overland Park, Kansas, and after a year I knew that the priesthood was not my calling. I decided to remain in the United States and continue working in parish ministry as a layperson. I met Teri, who was a volunteer teacher at the parish, and we started dating. We dated for almost a year before we became engaged.

Our engagement and preparation for the wedding was for us, as we’re sure it is for you, a time of great excitement. Most days were filled with joy and anticipation, but some brought frustration and stress—too many plans to make and too many people to please! There were days when we daydreamed of driving away, just the two of us, and getting married without telling anyone. Can you relate?

About two months before our wedding, our best man, Jim, called us and invited us to join him and his family on a picnic at a rustic retreat center in the hills of eastern Kansas. Jim wanted us to meet the founder and director of the retreat center, Fr. Edward Hays, who was beginning what would become a long and distinguished career as a spiritual writer. Fr. Ed welcomed us and asked why we had come. Jim explained that we were getting married in a couple of months and he thought we needed a break. He asked Fr. Ed to bless us, and with warm enthusiasm, Fr. Ed agreed to do so and suggested we go down to the river that ran through the property. Standing on the bank of that river, Fr. Edward Hays prayed over us, asking God to bless our union. We both recall with great fondness that day and that blessing because it reminds us that God is the foundation of our marriage and has been from the very beginning.

We were married in November 1972 in the presence of many family members and friends. Our marriage has been blessed with two daughters, a son-in-law, and now grandchildren. Both of us have worked in Catholic parishes. Teri has a bachelor’s degree in management and human relations. John has a master’s degree in theology and another in marriage counseling. John has also worked for two global corporations in the field of international human resources. While traveling all over the world for business, he continued writing articles on marriage and has published two books on growing strong marriages.

We have been involved in marriage-and-family ministry for most of our married life. It is a ministry we feel called to, and we are glad to have the opportunity to share our own experiences of married life with you through this program. We were brought together by circumstances unique to our lives, just as you and your fiancé have been brought together by circumstances unique to yours. We believe God’s grace drew us together and called us to Christian marriage and that he did the same for you and your fiancé. Perhaps you’ve never thought of your love in this sense of God calling you to be together, but we’d like to help you understand this calling, this vocation we call marriage. We believe God calls the two of you to marriage and gives you the graces you need so that you can be truly happy and be a sign in the world of his faithful, unending love.

We encourage you to approach this program with an open heart and mind, and most of all with the expectation of adventure. You will discover things that will be helpful to you in the months leading to your wedding day and in the years of married life that stretch out before you. No doubt you already know some of what is presented in the chapters of this book, but we are convinced there is nearly always something more to learn as we continue to discover and thank God for each day. It has been an honor for us to write this program for you. You were always in our thoughts and in our prayers as we wrote it, and you will continue to be. May we also be in yours.

Program Overview

Marriage requires a lot of effort and a clear map—a blueprint—for building a strong relationship. Joined by Grace gives you such a blueprint. The chapters of this book will introduce you to something we call the blueprint of love. You can use this to build a strong marriage, just as you would use an architectural blueprint to build a home. Let your participation in this program be a next crucial step in the construction of your life together. Each chapter will provide you with insights, ideas, and tools you can use in growing a strong marriage.

We will present this blueprint for love by weaving together three strands of wisdom: God’s revelation transmitted through sacred scripture and the Church’s sacraments; advice from marriage and family experts about what makes strong marriages; and the lived experiences of happily married couples whom you will meet in this book and in the short program videos you will view when meeting with your mentor couple or retreat leaders.

Knowing Christ through Scripture and Sacraments

The blueprint of love is like a fingerprint that God, the great artist, left on us when he created humanity—his masterpiece. He made us man and woman, in his image and likeness, capable of loving as he loves. This blueprint is imprinted in your heart, and you have already tapped into this grace by choosing to love your future spouse. In this book you will learn to rely on this grace more intentionally by learning to love better as Jesus loves us.

We come to know God’s plan for married love by reading the Bible, in which we learn about his unconditional and faithful love for his people Israel, and about Jesus’ all-embracing and self-emptying love for us. In a very particular way, we come to know about the love of Jesus when we participate in the sacraments of the Church: Baptism, Confirmation, Eucharist, Penance (often called Reconciliation), Anointing of the Sick, Holy Orders, and Matrimony. These are sacred rites by which the Church celebrates the abiding presence of God—the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit—in our everyday lives. In the sacraments, Jesus feeds us and heals our wounds and sinfulness; he calls us to follow him and gives us the graces we need to love one another. When we receive the sacraments, we are filled anew with God’s grace, which strengthens us as individuals and as spouses. And we encounter Jesus, who embraces us wholly and completely. Imagine for a moment hearing his voice in each sacrament:

Baptism: I accept you and welcome you to share my life.

Confirmation: I am always present to strengthen and guide you.

Eucharist: I give myself completely to you.

Reconciliation (or Penance): I forgive you.

The Anointing of the Sick: I comfort, console, and heal you.

Marriage and Holy Orders: I serve you, and together we serve the Father.

If you can honestly express these same commitments to your spouse each day you will have a strong marriage. You will be happy because your words and actions will be in harmony with the blueprint of love that God imprinted in your heart when he created you—that same blueprint that we learn about in the scriptures and we celebrate in the seven sacraments of the Catholic