Former US President and committed Christian Jimmy Carter stood up for gay rights at an assembly in Colorado on Monday.
"I never knew of any word or action of Jesus Christ that discriminated against anyone," he said in a video posted on mlive.com.
His remarks came in response to a question about human rights and the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) community at an event at Grand Rapids Community College, as part of their diversity lecture series.
"The sexual orientation of a person is just like the colour of their skin, or whether [...] they are poor or rich," Carter said.
"In the eyes of God they are just as good as we are," he added.
Since leaving office, Carter has become a vocal advocate for human rights and diplomacy. He set up the Carter Center in 1982, and was awarded the Nobel Prize for Peace in 2002.
Carter attends Maranatha Baptist Church in Georgia, where he continues to teach Sunday school.
In an interview with the Huffington Post in 2012 about his faith he said: "I personally think it is very fine for gay people to be married in civil ceremonies."
However, he explained that he did not think churches should be required by law to marry people.
"I'm a Baptist, and I believe that each congregation is autonomous and can govern its own affairs. So if a local Baptist church wants to accept gay members on an equal basis, which my church does by the way, then that is fine. If a church decides not to, then government laws shouldn't require them to," he said.
