Print 
PDF
Many Christians on social media took issue with Trisha Yearwood and her husband Garth Brooks' performance of John Lennon's 1971 song "Imagine" during the funeral of former President Jimmy Carter at Washington National Cathedral last Thursday.
Christians on X were offended by the song choice and pointed out that its lyrics are antithetical to the message of a Christian funeral.
Actually, the lyrics are antithetical to everything Christian.
I don't want to be disrespectful because I'm not.
But why would people who have been so public in serving in their local church and various communities through Habitat for Humanity choose that song for their funeral?
Be informed, not misled.
Yearwood and Brooks, who were friends with the Carters and worked for Habitat for Humanity's Carter Work Project for decades, also sang "Imagine" at former First Lady Rosalynn Carter's funeral in 2023.
Some said it was her favorite song.
Social media users expressed outrage over the song that Brooks and Yearwood performed during Jimmy Carter's funeral.
In response to their tribute to the late 39th President of the United States, X users furiously slammed Brooks, 62, and Yearwood, 60, for singing John Lennon's 1971 track, Imagine.
While it is no surprise the couple, who had a close relationship with Carter and his late wife Rosalynn, were tapped to perform, many took offense to the song, which many are saying wasn't the right choice for a memorial service in a Christian church.
The firestorm on social media largely centered on questioning the lyrical rejection of religion inside a church.
One of the most polarizing verses goes: "Imagine there’s no heaven / It’s easy if you try / No Hell below us / No heaven above us."
'Why would you sing this song at a Christian funeral? Weird,' one tweeted.
Another wrote: 'Of all the songs to play at a funeral; being held in a church! Horrible.'
One person said, "He really wanted everyone to imagine 'there’s no heaven'… in a church. At a funeral. Whoever made that call. ?"
A fourth pointed out: 'What a bad choice of song at a devout Christian's funeral. This is actually a terrible song if you listen to the words.'
'Why sing such in a Christian funeral? Imagine no heaven!!!!!????? Singing such in a church,' a fifth person asked.
Others accused the choice of this song of being 'disrespectful to Carter's memory.'
Erick Erickson pointed out it was hypocritical to have Joe Biden lecture us about what a strong Christian Jimmy Carter was before the crowd sits through the song "Imagine."'
'Why would any Christian have that sung at their funeral? Imagining there is no heaven and no Christianity at a Christian funeral is dark, indeed,' another wrote.
Christian leaders were shocked.
Bishop Robert Barron of the Diocese of Winona-Rochester in Minnesota issued an extensive statement on X expressing his disgust at the atheist anthem being featured in the nation's cathedral, which he suggested is symptomatic of cowardice in the American church.
"I was watching highlights from President Carter’s funeral service at the National Cathedral in Washington, DC," Barron wrote. "I found some of the speeches very moving. But I was appalled when two country singers launched into a rendition of John Lennon’s 'Imagine.'"
"Under the soaring vault of what I think is still a Christian church, they reverently intoned, 'Imagine there’s no heaven; it’s easy if you try' and 'imagine there’s no country; it isn’t hard to do. Nothing to kill or die for, and no religion too.' Vested ministers sat patiently while a hymn to atheistic humanism was sung."
Federalist editor-in-chief Mollie Hemingway posted on X " WHAT? Why would ANY Christian have that sung at their funeral? Imagining there is no heaven and no Christianity at a Christian funeral is dark, indeed."
WHAT? Why would ANY Christian have that sung at their funeral? Imagining there is no heaven and no Christianity at a Christian funeral is dark, indeed. https://t.co/64IaRvlOmz pic.twitter.com/cr9kOP892p
— Mollie (@MZHemingway) January 9, 2025
Some, however, found the performance 'perfect' and 'beautiful.'
Why would any Christian choose that song for their funeral?
.@GarthBrooks and @TrishaYearwood perform "Imagine" at President Jimmy Carter's State Funeral. pic.twitter.com/XPhnzjqCJS
— CSPAN (@cspan) January 9, 2025
Paul Anleitner, a cultural theologian and podcast host, described Lennon's song as "a terrible substitute hymn from an empty substitute religion of our Secular Age."
"It paints with this thin veneer of profundity and hope over the hollow, and frankly frightening, vision of a global, homogenous monoculture that has lost all distinction and genuine diversity," he said. "It presents a new global religion that has subsumed all other religions and cultures and lies about the fact that its peculiar brand of secular progressivism is, in fact, a religion with a clear eschatology and proposed plan for the salvation of the human race."
Lyrics to "Imagine"
Imagine there's no heaven
It's easy if you try
No hell below us
Above us, only sky
Imagine all the people
Livin' for today
Ah
Imagine there's no countries
It isn't hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion, too
Imagine all the people
Livin' life in peace
You
You may say I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope someday you'll join us
And the world will be as one
Imagine no possessions
I wonder if you can
No need for greed or hunger
A brotherhood of man
Imagine all the people
Sharing all the world
You
You may say I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope someday you'll join us
And the world will live as one
Father Patrick Briscoe, a Dominican friar and former parish priest at St. Pius V Church in Providence, Rhode Island, penned an op-ed arguing that "Imagine" replaces the hope of the Resurrection with "secular dreams."
"While the song may be considered an anthem of unity in our culture, its message is deeply opposed to Christian hope and the sacred purpose of a church," Briscoe wrote.
"The tragedy of 'Imagine' lies not in its longing for peace, but in its denial of the ultimate source of peace. True unity and justice cannot be achieved by erasing God; they are found in surrendering to him," he later added. "In moments of mourning, the human heart yearns for assurance. A Christian funeral doesn't merely console; it declares. It declares that death is not the end, that sin has been conquered, and that Christ has opened the gates of heaven."
This sort of incongruity happens every Sunday in many congregations. Many draw near God with their mouths but are far off in their hearts.
Carter, who described himself as a born-again Christian and taught Sunday school at Maranatha Baptist Church in Plains, Georgia, drew criticism in his later years for drifting from biblical teaching, such as when he made headlines in 2018 for claiming that "Jesus would approve of gay marriage."
Carter said, “I think Jesus would encourage any love affair if it was honest and sincere and was not damaging to anyone else, and I don’t see that gay marriage damages anyone else.”
Lennon, who was raised Anglican, generally rejected organized religion, though he briefly claimed to have converted to Christianity in the 1970s after corresponding with Oral Roberts and Pat Robertson.
He famously set off a firestorm of controversy in 1966 when, during an interview with the London Evening Standard, he made an offhand remark comparing the Beatles' fame with that of Jesus.
"Christianity will go," Lennon said. "It will vanish and shrink. ... We’re more popular than Jesus now."
I don't know the heart or the motives of why this song would be used in a Christian funeral in a Christian church.
I do know that Paul, writing to a young pastor named Timothy (I Tim.4: 1,2), " Now the Spirit speaketh expressly, that in the latter times some shall depart from the faith, giving heed to seducing spirits, and doctrines of devils; Speaking lies in hypocrisy; having their conscience seared with a hot iron."
Beware. Be Informed. Be Discerning. Be Vigilant. Be Faithful. Be Prayerful.