Jimmy Carter, Beloved Sunday School Teacher, Ex-President, Dead at 100

Jimmy Carter passes away
Former President Jimmy Carter, in an interview April 11, 2018, in Atlanta. (AP Photo/John Amis)

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(RNS) — Jimmy Carter, who died Sunday (Dec. 29) at age 100, was known most as the 39th president of the United States. But he also will be remembered as the world’s most famous Sunday school teacher.

Carter, who spoke openly about his Baptist faith while campaigning for the White House in 1976, earned the votes of many evangelical Christians when he called himself “born again.”

Carter died at his home in Plains, Georgia, surrounded by family, according to a statement on The Carter Center website.

“My father was a hero, not only to me but to everyone who believes in peace, human rights, and unselfish love,” said his son Chip Carter in the statement. “My brothers, sister, and I shared him with the rest of the world through these common beliefs.”

After leaving the White House in 1981, Carter spent decades as a humanitarian and advocate for peace — building houses with Habitat for Humanity, monitoring elections in dozens of countries, helping fight against Guinea worm disease.

Still, more Sundays than not, the former president had a regular appointment: teaching Sunday school in his rural Georgia Baptist church.

Maranatha Baptist Church posted his schedule on its website, listing dates he would be there to teach. It included frequently asked questions about the do’s and don’ts of a visit to the church in Plains. (Yes, pictures could be taken at the end of the worship service with Carter and his wife, Rosalynn. No, the Carters do not give autographs at the church.)

Rosalynn Carter died at the age of 96 on Nov. 19, 2023.

More recently, the church added a “Carter Challenge” page where people could “tell your Jimmy Carter story,” after hearing him encourage Sunday school attendees to “do one good thing for one other person.”

“Jimmy Carter’s identity is inseparable from his almost lifelong vocation — 60, 70 years — as a Sunday school teacher,” said historian Bill Leonard, professor of divinity emeritus at Wake Forest University School of Divinity. “He has lived every week of his adult life in the study and teaching of the Scriptures.”

Carter was the only U.S. president to have taught Sunday school while in office, according to the White House Historical Association. William McKinley and Theodore Roosevelt taught Sunday school before entering the White House, and Benjamin Harrison led a Bible study class after his presidency at First Presbyterian Church in Indianapolis.

Carter, a Nobel Peace Prize winner, spoke matter-of-factly about his long-term Bible teaching in a 2014 appearance at the LBJ Presidential Library.

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AdelleMBanks@churchleaders.com'
Adelle M Bankshttp://religionnews.com
Adelle M. Banks, production editor and a national reporter, joined RNS in 1995. An award-winning journalist, she previously was the religion reporter at the Orlando Sentinel and a reporter at The Providence Journal and newspapers in the upstate New York communities of Syracuse and Binghamton.

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