People are camping out overnight to watch Jimmy Carter teach Sunday school

Whenever hordes of giddy fans camp out in a parking lot, there's a solid chance One Direction is somewhere nearby. But Harry Styles wasn't anywhere to be found at the Georgia church where crowds gathered in their cars and RVs Saturday night and into Sunday morning — it was former President Jimmy Carter the masses wanted to see.

When Carter, 90, announced in August that the cancer in his liver had spread to his brain, he stayed firm on his commitment to teaching Sunday school at Maranatha Baptist Church. The first Sunday afterward, more than 800 people waited in line to see the former president.

The crowds have only grown bigger since. People are driving hours and hours — and some are even flying — to make it to the church parking lot before 12:01 a.m. Sunday, when seat assignments in the pews are awarded. The line this Saturday was already a half-mile long by 9 p.m., The Washington Post reports.

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"We're gung-ho people!" Pat Schroeder, a 93-year-old who roadtripped the 14 hours from Illinois with her kids, told the Post.