Late ex President Jimmy Carter he reportedly held John Lennon’s 1971 hit “Imagine” as his favorite song. But its use as a song at his state funeral sparked a firestorm on social media from critics who said it was inappropriate for use in a Christian church’s memorial service.
On Thursday, fellow Georgia native Trisha Yearwood and her husband Garth Brooks performed the song during Carter’s funeral service at Washington National Cathedral. A year earlier, Brooks and Yearwood also performed it at former first lady Rosalynn Carter’s wake. The country star pair previously worked with Carter on several Habitat for Humanity projects, according to reports.
Social media lit up later on Thursday, questioning the performance of the song, given her a lyrical rejection of religion.
“Imagine there’s no heaven / It’s easy if you try / There’s no hell below us / Above us, only heaven,” says the first line.
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Former President Jimmy Carter. (Emma Woodhead/Fox Digital)
At X, several observers, including top conservative figures, questioned the use of the song, while others disagreed.
“The fact that Joe Biden lectured us about what a strong Christian Jimmy Carter was before the audience started reading ‘Imagine’ with the lyrics ‘Imagine there’s no heaven / It’s easy if you try’ makes me question the authenticity of that claim” , said commentator Erick Erickson, who also served on the Macon City Council in Carter’s home state.
“Imagine there’s no heaven — sung for someone who’s a devout Southern Baptist,” added one X user.
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“I don’t think Jimmy would appreciate the ‘no religion’ part,” said another.
Self-proclaimed “Trumpocrat” Steve Carlson, Minnesota’s Democratic incumbent now running for governor in 2026, wrote that it was an “insult” to play “Imagine” at Carter’s funeral.
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“Why would any Christian want that sung at their funeral? To imagine that there is no heaven and no Christianity at a Christian funeral is really dark,” said Mollie Z. Hemingway, editor of The Federalist and a frequent participant on Fox News’ “All-Star Panel.” “Special Report with Bret Baier.”
A prominent member of the Catholic clergy also hit out at Xu, saying he was “disgusted” by the performance.
“Under the high arch of what I think is still a Christian church, they reverently intoned: ‘Imagine there is no heaven; it is easy if you try,’ and “Imagine there is no earth; it is not hard to do. Nothing to kill or die for, and not even for religion.’ — Vested priests sat patiently as a hymn to atheistic humanism was sung, said Bishop Robert Barron, prelate Catholic Archdiocese from Winona-Rochester, Minnesota.
“This was not just an insult to the memory of a devoutly believing Christian but also an indicator of the spinelessness of too established religion in our country”, said the bishop.
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Jim Geraghty of the National Review said that the fact that “Imagine” asks the listener to imagine the absence of heaven is a “de facto concession” that it exists, in an apparent defense of the performance.
“Otherwise, there would be no need to ask us to imagine otherwise,” Geraghty said.
Lennon himself had a complicated view of Christianity and organized religion, but he especially corresponded with Christian preachers such as Oral Roberts.
“I was raised a Christian and I’m only now understanding some of the things Christ was saying in those parables,” Lennon was also quoted as saying. “God is the term by which we measure our own pain.”
