Some commenters on the YouTube stream of the funeral for the late President Jimmy Carter thought it looked like music night at the Senior Citizens Center. Mebbe. A funeral service filled with old people remembering an even older person is preferable to young people honoring the death of another young person. Watching this funeral was a reminder of the olden days and in order to move forward, we must respect and honor the past.

When Jimmy Carter died, I rolled my eyes. Dear God, we have seen the pictures. I thought he was mostly dead at Roslynn’s funeral in late 2023.

It seems like the announcement of the passing of Jimmy Carter (JC) is drawing nearer. They told us that he went into hospice in January of 2023 (world record?). They wheeled out some masked creature posing as Jimmy Carter at Roslynn’s supposed funeral in November 2023. https://t.co/0EpUlJReqh pic.twitter.com/YwTCUmKQak

— Michael In Truth (@MichaelInTruth) May 15, 2024

Hospice Nurse Julie explained the open mouth at the time.

Ditto the rolling eyes, when he was lying in state at the Carter Center in Atlanta. Lying in state in the U.S. Capitol, another eye roll. I didn’t remember a lot about the Carter Presidency but I remembered the odd and even license plate thing for gas. In college, I learned that the gas crisis was contrived, that he gave away the Panama Canal for a buck, and that he was blatantly anti-Semitic. There’s more but that’s not what I want to talk about.

Naturally, I rolled my eyes about the service at the National Cathedral. I was going to watch because the Cathedral is so beautiful and then I saw them altogether. The rogues’ gallery of Presidents and Vice Presidents.

All five living Presidents are seated in close proximity to each other at the funeral service of former President Jimmy Carter. pic.twitter.com/6bIQ0tGpzr

— DK (@1Nicdar) January 9, 2025

Prince Edward, the Duke of Edinburgh was there as was Justin Trudeau, who has sort of resigned as Prime Minister but not quite. Failed candidates Al Gore and John Kerry were there. Hillary was there as former First Lady, not failed candidate, but former First Lady Michelle Obama apparently had to rearrange her sock drawer. Steven Ford, son of late President Gerald Ford, spoke words his father had written, beautifully. Late Carter Vice President Walter Mondale’s son spoke words his father had similarly written.

I loved Jason Carter’s eulogy to President Carter:

Former President Jimmy Carter’s house was filled with items like so many other southern grandparents’: fishing trophies, a phone with a landline and a fridge covered with photos of grandchildren and great-grandchildren, his grandson Jason Carter said.

“And demonstrating their Depression-era roots, they had a little rack next to the sink where they would hang Ziploc bags to dry,” Jason Carter said, as the crowd laughed.

“In my 49 years, I never perceived a difference between his public face and his private one. He was the same person,” Jason Carter said. “For me, that’s the definition of integrity.”

“His political life and his presidency, for me, was not just ahead of its time — it was prophetic. He had the courage and strength to stick to his principles, even when they were politically unpopular,” Jason Carter said. “As governor of Georgia half a century ago, he preached an end to racial discrimination and an end to mass incarceration. As president in the 1970s, as you’ve heard, he protected more land than any other president in history. Fifty years ago, he was a climate warrior who pushed for a world where we conserved energy, limited emissions and traded our reliance on fossil fuels for expanded renewable sources.”

That’s right, he was an early adopter of the lies and hysteria. ABC News left out the best part of this Carter eulogy. Jason got a call from his grandfather’s cell phone. His grandfather said he wasn’t trying to call him, he was trying to take a picture. We could all identify. I never did explain it right to my father-in-law:

Jason Carter tells a joke about how his grandfather Jimmy once called him by accident as he was taking a photo w/ his new cell phone. Everyone laughs bit the secret service men on the right in the 3rd row – and Donald. Even Melania finally made an expression! pic.twitter.com/939ojMlftX

— MandoFett (@empath2afault) January 9, 2025

Joe Biden asked to eulogize Jimmy Carter was Joe Biden. Here is a portion from the Savannah Morning News:

“Faith, founded on commandments of scripture. Love the Lord thy God with all my heart and all thy mind and all thy soul. And love thy neighbor as thyself. Easy to say, but very difficult to do. In his life, in this life, any walk of faith can be difficult. It can be lonely, but it requires action to be the doers of the world. But in that commandment lies the essence, in my view, found in the gospel, found in many faith traditions and found in the very idea of America. Because the very journey of our nation is a walk of sheer faith, to do the work, to be the country we say we are. To be the country we say we want to be. A nation where all are created equal in the image of God and deserve to being treated equally throughout our lives. We’ve never fully lived up to that idea of America. We’ve never walked away from it either, because of Patriots like Jimmy Carter.”

Carter opens his mouth and doesn’t listen to a word that comes out. He was an important reminder that Jimmy Carter is no long in the top two for worst Presidents. Woodrow Wilson and Joe Biden take the top two spots.

So, today we honored and respected the past and I am ever hopeful that we will learn not to repeat the past.

I want to leave you with “Eternal Father, Strong to Save”. A beautiful hymn, beautifully executed with great visuals of our beautiful National Cathedral.

I don’t know about you, but that rendition of “Eternal Father, Strong to Save," performed by the U.S. Marine Orchestra and Armed Forces Chorus at President Carter’s funeral was the most beautiful & moving I’ve heard in a long time. I’ll bet it was overwhelming inside the National… pic.twitter.com/lOrA0CGmMx

— Matthew T. Fritz (@fritzmt) January 9, 2025

Honor and Respect.

Featured Image: Cspan Screengrab/X/Public Domain