The U.S. flags on federal buildings and some state/municipal buildings are still set at half-staff in compliance with our nation’s thirty-day period of mourning the death of the thirty-nineth President, James Earl Carter Jr. They will remain at half-staff until January 28th., unless President-elect Trump raises them as soon as he takes office. In my view, former President Carter’s funeral was a very somber and significant service, giving those who offered eulogies the opportunity to help the nation reflect genuinely on the essential quality of his life and legacy. Each did admirably from Stu Eizenstat to Jason Carter, a grandson, Steven Ford, who read a posthumous eulogy written by his father, President Gerald Ford, before his death in 2006, and Ted Mondale, who likewise read a eulogy written by his father in 2015. The line I liked best from all of these was offered by Vice President Walter Mondale, appearing as a a postscript:
Toward the end of our time in the White House, the President and I were talking about how we might describe what we tried to do. We came up with this summary of what we were trying to do, ‘We told the truth, we obeyed the law, and we kept the peace.’ (Walter Mondale, 2015)
I thought too that President Joe Biden spoke profound and deeply personal truths about his good friend, Jimmy Carter, truths that are at the heart of his true legacy. Heather Cox Richerdson, in her Substack newsletter of January 9th, 2025, reported on what Biden said:
…In what appeared to be a reflection on the incoming president in the audience, who for years has mocked Carter as the worst president in history, Biden focused on what he called Carter’s “enduring attribute: character, character, character.” And, Biden said, quoting the famous saying from the ancient Greek philosopher Heraclitus: “Character…is destiny,” both in our lives and in the life of the nation.
Carter taught him, Biden said, that “strength of character is more than title or the power we hold. It’s the strength to understand that everyone should be treated with dignity, respect. That everyone, and I mean everyone, deserves an even shot. Not a guarantee, but just a shot…. [W]e have an obligation to give hate no safe harbor, and to stand up to what my dad used to say is the greatest sin of all: the abuse of power.”
Character, Biden said, is not about being perfect, for none of us are perfect. It’s about “asking ourselves: Are we striving to do…the right things? What are the values that animate our spirit? To operate from fear or hope, ego, or generosity? Do we show grace? Do we keep the faith when it’s most tested?”
Inspiring words, don’t you think? Within the context of honoring both Jimmy Carter and Martin Luther King, aught we not be pondering the formidable challenge of living with exemplary and enduring character, character, character?
January 20th is but 5 days away, a big day for sure. It is our son, Peter’s birthday. It is the date for the CFP’s championship game. The day is also set aside for the national observance of Martin Luther King Jr. Day. Finally, it is Inauguration Day. The juxtaposition of the last two gave occasion for some controversy and consternation. While some opined that it was an antithetical historical coincidence, Dr. Bernice King, the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s daughter, however, welcomed the contrasts in character. On the one side, we have Carter and King. On the other, we have Donald J. Trump. About this striking contrast, she wrote:
As we prepare for a new presidential administration — or a repeat in some ways — this King holiday, I am calling on all people of goodwill and conscience to do more than commemorate and celebrate King for a day, I’m calling us to do more than quote King, which we love to do.
“I always ask people, are you doing it in the spirit of Dr. King? You know, are you doing it from a compassionate place, from a love-centered place? Are you doing it in a way that respects the dignity and worth of all individuals?
In addition to honoring her father on the observance of his birthday, she called on people to pledge to work daily at “learning how to live together, together as brothers and sisters” and to commit daily “to embrace the spirit of nonviolence.”
Finally, she connected the flag at half-staff and the monument of granite commemorating her father saying:
Both President Jimmy Carter and my father showed us what is possible when your faith compels you to live and lead from a love-centered place,
On the day of former President Jimmy Carter’s funeral, David Brooks, the much-acclaimed columnist for the New Tork Times, wrote an exceptional op-ed titled, “Character-Building Tool Kit” (NYT January 9th, 2025). He begins with these words:
I’ve always liked the TV character Ted Lasso’s definition of moral education. Being a soccer coach, he said, is “about helping these young fellas be the best versions of themselves on and off the field.”
A few years ago, a University of Pennsylvania psychologist, Angela Duckworth, got a bit more specific. She wrote that character formation means building up three types of strengths: strengths of the heart (being kind, considerate, generous), strengths of the mind (being curious, open-minded, having good judgment) and strengths of the will (self-control, determination, courage).
I’m one of those people who think character is destiny and that moral formation is at the center of any healthy society.
Yet another inspiring piece of prose! Don’t you think? ‘…character is destiny, and … moral formation is at the heart of any healthy society.’
Brook’s article is a vital read. Please look it up. One of the essential tools in his kit for character formation is what he calls Deep Reading.
Deep reading. Students learn about these traditions (moral traditions) by studying the great texts of each. It’s noteworthy that most great moral traditions ask people to passionately study difficult texts — whether it’s the Torah, “The Odyssey,” the Quran or even “Das Kapital.” The charge is not just to read certain books, but to devour them, to enter into them and struggle within them, until the deeper meanings enter the blood. Kafka famously said that “a book must be the ax for the frozen sea inside us.”
I worry today about that frozen sea inside many of us, a hardness of heart that accommodates such things as white Christian nationalism, mass detentions and deportations of immigrants, cuts to Medicare and Medicaid, programs for the poor and homeless, rampant misogyny, the death penalty and the mistreatment and discrimination against the LGBTQ and Trans community and other detestable things. In our case, it is the Holy Bible that is meant to be the ax. We are called to study passionately our sacred texts, to devour them, to enter them and struggle within them until the deeper meanings enter the blood. Faith is birthed there and does its thing, namely, compels us to live and lead from a love-centered place. It is by faith that we reveal bravely, what King called, the content of our character.
January 20th is but five days away. All over this country we will remember and honor King’s life and legacy, keeping his dream alive and motivating an army of activists to make the dream a reality. In his “I Have a Dream” speech, he quotes a devoured text from the Prophet Isaiah 40: 4-5 and reveals the power of his faith. Read with me the soaring eloquence of his testimony. (August 28, 1968)
I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, and every hill and mountain shall be made low, the rough places will be made plain, and the crooked places will be made straight; "and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed and all flesh shall see it together."2
This is our hope, and this is the faith that I go back to the South with.
With this faith, we will be able to hew out of the mountain of despair a stone of hope. With this faith, we will be able to transform the jangling discords of our nation into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood. With this faith, we will be able to work together, to pray together, to struggle together, to go to jail together, to stand up for freedom together, knowing that we will be free one day.
We share this dream, I know it! I also know that it is our faith in Jesus Christ and our fealty to His teachings that reveal the enduring strengths of our character, its strength of heart, mind and will.