Jon Trott
A Biographical Sketch

A partial list of Jon's writings (both in Cornerstone magazine and elsewhere) are here. Jon also heads up CART, Cornerstone's apologetics ministry.

Jon Trott edits Cornerstone magazine (both the hard copy version and the online site). He has lived in Chicago as a member of the Jesus People USA community since 1977.

Jon was born in 1957 in Fort Benton, Montana, and encountered Christ definitively on a farm outside Highwood in the summer of 1973. His father, James E. Trott, is a Harvard graduate (as well as a renowned western artist), but Jon took the road less traveled and dropped out of Gordon college (Wenham, Mass.) to as noted join the JPUSA "Jesus commune" in 1977. (See Jon's history of JPUSA.) Not long after this step, he began writing for "The National Jesus Paper," Cornerstone. In late 1978, Cornerstone went from newspaper to magazine format, thematically continuing to cover various issues, including issues related to NRMs, or new religious movements (the "cults" as they were then called).

Since that time, Trott has moved from being a writer to an editor and finally editor in chief of Cornerstone. He has also written for other magazines including Eternity, CCM, Priscilla Papers, Christian History, and Communities. He has one co-written book to his credit, Selling Satan: Mike Warnke and the Evangelical Media, and one book of poetry, Trees, Roots, and Growing Things, which now is available in toto online along with other such stuff. Jon's writing has received various awards, including an Evangelical Press Association Higher Goals award in the humorous category and the investigative reporting category (the Mike Warnke story). Jon's work has been written about in Columbia Journalism Review and the Skeptical Inquirer. Less favorably, he has been called a "cult apologist" by one critic, but his feelings weren't too badly hurt. Another critic called him a 'reactionary nun that likes rock and roll,' which frankly, was pretty good as insults go. Cornerstone's CART -- Cornerstone Apologetics Research Team -- continues to cover NRM-related issues just so Jon can stay in trouble.

Jon also has written lyrics over the years for the well-known hard rock band, REZ (Resurrection) Band, as well has having done a weekly 1980s-era radio program, "Lightshine Theatre," on WXRT and another now-defunct Chicago station. He is also known for having had one of JPUSAs first mohawk hair cuts in the early 80s and for having one of the shortest hair cuts nowadays. And if you're really into trivia, the first Resurrection Band album, "Awaiting Your Reply," begins with a radio dj who calls himself "Jolly Jonah Jamison"... that spiel, and the voice intoning it, was Jon circa 1978. Amaze your friends.

Jon married Jesus movement pioneer Carol Elaine Durkin of Grand Forks, North Dakota, in 1989 and their blended family includes four adult children -- two daughters, Tamzen and Tabitha, and two sons, Christopher (Cornerstone's music editor) and Trevor. (The lads are in a band, the blamed, which gives them an excuse to tour Europe if nothing else.) Carol and Jon are cultural opposites -- his tats and piercings make her smile enigmatically -- but romantic and spiritual mates.