It's Friday, January 10, 2025.

I'm Albert Moeller, and this is The Briefing, a daily analysis of news and events from a Christian worldview.

Yesterday in the National Cathedral in Washington, D.C., a state funeral was held to honor former President Jimmy Carter, the 39th president of the

United States. It was a traditional Christian service in terms of its structure and in terms of its

context, but it was a very interesting affair, and it was a state funeral. So let's just talk about

that for a moment. There are funerals, there are memorial services,

and there is, in a very few cases, a state funeral. What's the distinction? Well, the distinction

between a funeral and a memorial service generally is whether or not the body is present.

In a funeral, which is by far the majority Christian tradition, the body is present, and it is

considered an official act of Christian worship. Memorial services generally are held when the body

is not present. That's the distinction. And at least in terms of how these things came about,

memorial services were often held when the body was not available,

or when the date had to be after an appropriate period of holding onto the body after death,

or some kind of similar circumstance.

And then you have a state funeral.

What's the distinction between a funeral again, the body present, and a state funeral?

And the answer is, a state funeral isn't a, a state funeral is an affair of the government. In the United States, state funerals are rare, and in terms of

our national life, they have to come with some kind of federal authorization. Generally, in the

United States, that means a president or a former president of the

United States. But there have been 45 individuals, and I know Donald Trump is about to be inaugurated

as the 47th president of the United States, but Donald Trump and Grover Cleveland will go down

in history as the two presidents who served non-concurrent terms.

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