John was born on Saturday, April 21, 1951, in Morristown, NJ, to Gordon (1919-95) and Lena (1914-) Rogers, the third of four children—Marilyn (1941), Timothy (1947), and Robert (1953)—and was raised in a Pentecostal-Holiness tradition (Church of God in Christ,). He married Barbara Thelma Washington (b. Saturday, April 24, 1943, the third of five children of Booker and Helen Washington), on Saturday, May 31, 1975. John worked in religious publishing from 1976 to 1988—Union Gospel Press (Cleveland, OH, 1976-82) and Mennonite Publishing House (Scottdale, PA. 1982-88). He left publishing in 1988 and, while self-employed, studied at Duquesne University's Institute of Formative Spirituality until it closed in 1994. In 1996, John began working as financial, human resource and network administrator for the Center for Family Excellence, a family-support nonprofit agency in Pittsburgh's Hill District. He left the Center in 2015 and worked as a financial advisor for a provider of assisted living services, Pathways Community Living (Allison Park, PA) until he retired in May 2017. John and Barbara have lived in the Point Breeze North (formerly Homewood) neighborhood of Pittsburgh since 1982.
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