Former President Jimmy Carter said he believes that "Jesus would approve of gay marriage."
Carter, who describes himself as a born-again Christian and continues to teach Sunday school at his local church, told HuffPost Live, "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."
Carter added, however, that he did not think the government should be able to force any church to perform same-sex marriage if that congregation did not want to do so.
He explained that this would not infringe on the rights of the same-sex couple, because they could get married in a civil ceremony or at a different church.
The former president admitted that he could not point to any specific passages in the Bible that backed up his belief, stressing that it was his personal feeling about the subject based on the overall teachings of Jesus.
Carter, who spoke at length about how his faith has influenced his politics and his life, did say, however, that he has "had a problem with abortion," because he doesn't believe Jesus would approve of most abortions.
"I have a hard time believing that Jesus, for instance, would approve abortions unless it was because of rape or incest or if the mother's life was in danger," said Carter, who became president just a few years after the Supreme Court legalized abortion in the landmark case Roe v. Wade.
"I've had that struggle [with abortion], but my oath of office was to obey the Constitution and the laws of this country as interpreted by the Supreme Court, so I went along with that," he added.
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