Ford explained that his father and Carter jokingly agreed to deliver eulogies at each other’s funerals, a promise Carter made good on when Ford died in 2006. Steven Ford said it had been left to him to return the favor. “As for myself, Jimmy: I’m looking forward to our reunion,” he said, reading his late father’s words. “We have much to catch up on. Thank you, Mr. President. Welcome home, old friend.”
Ford was followed by Ted Mondale, a former Minnesota state senator and son of Walter Mondale, Carter’s vice president. Reading a tribute written by his father, who died in 2021, the younger Mondale said: “I was also a small-town kid who grew up in Methodist church where my dad was a preacher, and our faith was core to me, as Carter’s faith was core to him. That common commitment to our faith created a bond between us that allowed us to understand each other and find ways to work together.”
Stuart Eizenstat, a former White House adviser, also addressed the power of Carter’s strongly held religious beliefs, saying they “brought integrity to the presidency” in the wake of the Watergate scandal and discord over the Vietnam War. Eizenstat said Carter’s faith also “respected other religions,” noting he was the first president to light a Hanukkah menorah and hosted a Shabbat dinner at Camp David for the Israeli delegation while negotiating the historic Camp David Accords.
Carter’s religious values, Eizenstat said, “gave him an unshakable sense of right and wrong, animating his support for civil rights at home and human rights abroad.”
He added, grinning: “Jimmy Carter has earned his place in heaven, but just as he was free with sometimes unsolicited advice for his presidential successors, the Lord of all creation should be ready for Jimmy’s recommendations on how to make God’s realm a more peaceful place.”
Jason Carter, another of Carter’s grandchildren and a onetime Georgia gubernatorial candidate, also spoke. Noting that Carter and his wife, Rosalynn, spent more of their lives outside the halls of power than in them, he reflected on his grandfather’s dedication to the biblical edict to “love your neighbor as yourself,” and how it informed his work with the Carter Center, which observes democratic elections around the world and has helped eradicate disease.
“I believe that love is what taught him and told him to preach the power of human rights, not just for some people, but for all people,” he said. “It focused him on the power and the promise of democracy, its love for freedom, its requirement and founding belief in the wisdom of regular people raising their voices, and the requirement that you respect all of those voices, not just some.”
He also recalled Carter’s efforts to broker peace between Israelis and Palestinians that resulted in the Camp David Accords, and his more controversial advocacy for the Palestinian people.
“His heart broke for the people of Israel,” he said. “It broke for the people of Palestine, and he spent his life trying to bring peace to that Holy Land.”
The Rev. Andrew Young, a pastor, aide to Martin Luther King Jr. and congressman before serving as U.S. ambassador to the U.N. under Carter, was the last to offer thoughts on Carter’s life. Referring to Carter as “something of a miracle,” he related that when Carter enrolled at the Naval Academy, the future president requested that his roommate be the Black midshipman at the school.
“But that was the sensitivity, the spirituality that made James Earl Carter a truly great president,” said Young, who also previously served as head of the National Council of Churches. “James Earl Carter was truly a child of God.”
“Jimmy Carter was a blessing that helped to create a great United States of America,” he said, adding, “He may be gone, but he ain’t gone far.”
 for the state funeral of President Jimmy Carter.){kind=link}