The deceased former President Jimmy Carter he reportedly held the 1971 John Lennon hit “Imagine” as his favorite tune. But its use as a song at his state funeral ceremony has caused a social media storm from critics who said it was inappropriate for use at a memorial service in a Christian church.
On Thursday, the tune was performed by fellow American Trisha Yearwood and her husband Garth Brooks during Carter’s funeral service at the Washington National Cathedral. A year earlier, Brooks and Yearwood also performed it at former first lady Rosalynn Carter’s wake. According to reports, the country star couple previously worked with Carter on several Habitat for Humanity home projects.
Social media lit up later Thursday, casting doubt on the song’s performance lyrical rejection of religion.
“Imagine there’s no heaven / It’s easy if you try / No hell below us / Above us, just sky,” the first line goes.
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Former President Jimmy Carter. (Emma Woodhead/Fox Digital)
On X, several observers, including top conservative figures, questioned the use of the song, while others differed.
“Now that Joe Biden is lecturing us on what a strong Christian Jimmy Carter was before the audience sits through ‘Imagine’ with the lyrics ‘Imagine there’s no Heaven /It’s easy if you try’ makes me question the authenticity of the claim,” said commentator Erick. Erickson, who also served on the Macon City Council in Carter’s home state.
“Imagine There Is No Heaven – sung to someone who is a devout Southern Baptist,” an X user added.
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“I don’t think Jimmy would appreciate the ‘no religion’ part,” said another.
Self-styled “Trumpocrat” Steve Carlson, a perennial Democratic candidate from Minnesota who is now running for governor in 2026, wrote that having “Imagine” played at Carter’s funeral is an “insult.”
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“Why would a Christian have that sung at his funeral? To imagine that there is no heaven and no Christianity at a Christian funeral is dark indeed,” said Mollie Z. Hemingway, Federalist editor and frequent “All-Star Panel”ist on Fox. News’ “Special Report with Bret Baier.”
A prominent member of the Catholic clergy also agreed with X, saying he was “shocked” by the action.
“Under the towering vault of what I believe is still a Christian church, they said reverently: ‘Imagine there is no heaven; it is easy if you try’ and ‘imagine there is no country; it is not difficult to do. Nothing to kill or kill.” die for, and no religion either.” — Established ministers sat patiently as a hymn to atheist humanism was sung,” said Bishop Robert Barron, prelate of the Catholic Archdiocese of Winona-Rochester, Minnesota.
‘This was not just an insult to the memory of a devoutly religious Christian but also an indication of the spinelessness of too much of the established religion in our country,” the bishop said.
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Jim Geraghty of the National Review said that the fact “Imagine” asks the listener to imagine that the absence of heaven is a “de facto concession” that it exists, in apparent defense of the rendition.
“Otherwise there would be no need to ask us to imagine something different,” Geraghty said.
Lennon himself had a complicated view of Christianity and organized religion, but corresponded mainly with Christian preachers such as Oral Roberts.
“I was raised a Christian and I’m just now understanding some of the things Christ said in those parables,” Lennon has also quoted. “God is a concept by which we measure our own pain.”
