Former U.S. President and Emory University Distinguished Professor Jimmy Carter told his church congregation Sunday that he was “completely at ease with death.”
Carter was hospitalized on Oct. 21 following a fall that shattered his pelvis. This was Carter’s second fall in October and his third fall this year.
From a motorized lift chair, Carter told the congregation of about 400 people that he had accepted his own death years ago. In August 2015, Carter announced that he had developed melanoma in his liver that spread to his brain over time.
“I obviously prayed about it,” Carter said, according to CBS News. “I didn’t ask God to let me live, but I just asked God to give me a proper attitude toward death. And I found that I was absolutely and completely at ease with death.”
The former president was treated at the Winship Cancer Institute and announced in December 2015 that he was cancer-free.
At 95 years old, Carter has exceeded George H.W. Bush to become the nation’s longest-living former president. His 73-year marriage with Rosalynn Carter, which began in 1946, is also the longest presidential union.
After serving as the 39th president of the U.S.from 1977 to 1981, Carter devoted himself to the promotion of human rights through the Carter Center, a non-governmental and nonprofit organization that aims to improve democracy around the world. In 2002, Carter was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for his work "to find peaceful solutions to international conflicts, to advance democracy and human rights, and to promote economic and social development."
