Antoinette Bosco, Journalist

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Writer Antoinette Bosco used life’s lessons, both the difficult and the rewarding, to inspire others to find hope in God throughout her long career as a journalist and columnist.

From confronting the tragedy of losing her son and daughter-in-law to murder at the hands of an 18-year-old gunman to the simple joys of parenthood, Ms. Bosco also rooted her work in the teachings of the Catholic faith in the hope that her readers would come to know that they are called to persevere.

Ms. Bosco died March 20 at her Brookfield, Conn., home. She was 91.

As a columnist for Catholic News Service for 37 years, her columns were carried in Catholic New York for a number of years.

Her work also appeared in other publications such as Ladies’ Home Journal, Woman’s Day, Reader’s Digest, Guideposts, Catholic Digest, The New York Times and The Hartford Courant in Connecticut.

Ms. Bosco got her start as a writer, freelancing while raising her seven children, including a homeless boy she adopted. Her work focused on Catholic social issues. Her biography of a Belgian bishop was the first of 18 books she would write in her long career.

Her decadelong marriage ended in divorce.

In 1962, she became a reporter for The Long Island Catholic, newspaper of the Diocese of Rockville Centre. She left the newspaper in 1972 to take a position promoting the health sciences center at the State University of New York at Stony Brook. Three years later, she started writing her column for CNS, continuing until 2012.

After a decade, she accepted a position as editor of a daily newspaper in Litchfield County, Conn., to be closer to her ailing father. She was with the paper for 17 years.

Three of her children predeceased her. After her son John and daughter-in-law, Nancy, were killed at their Montana home, Ms. Bosco and her family worked to spare the life of the young man who was convicted of the deaths when he was sentenced to death row.

Throughout their efforts, they pointed to Church teaching on the sanctity of life and opposition to capital punishment. Ms. Bosco also wrote “Choosing Mercy: A Mother of Murder Victims Pleads to End the Death Penalty,” published in 2001. The book received a Christopher Award.

Born in Rome, N.Y., she graduated with a degree in science and chemistry from the College of St. Rose in Albany. She earned a master’s in liberal studies from SUNY-Stony Brook.

Her work to end capital punishment was recognized by the Connecticut Network to Abolish the Death Penalty, which presented her its Walter Everett Humanitarian Award.

She is survived by four children, two brothers and two sisters, 15 grandchildren, 21 great-grandchildren and eight great-great-grandchildren.
—CNS

Antoinette Bosco