Who should enrage us more, clergy that promote hate or clergy that are silent?

Over the past several days, there has been a lots of local news coverage concerning an Anglican priest who used a Nazi salute at a recent National Pro-Life Summit.

The Anglican priest in question is Calvin Robinson, who has a long history of being part of the political and religious right, according to a recent MLive piece. 

Now, to be clear, I find people like Calvin Robinson disgusting, not just because of what they say, but the political climate it helps to foster that results in violence against individuals – usually those who are most vulnerable in society, along with the systemic violence that institutions and public policy perpetrate, which is even more objectionable. 

What Calvin Robinson stands for is nothing new. Robinson is part of a long legacy of people and organizations that have not been shy about their white supremacist views, their colonialist views, their perpetuation of misogyny, their anti-reproductive justice views, and their anti-trans and heterosexist beliefs. 

In the US we are all too familiar with organizations like the KKK, the Proud Boys, the Oath Keepers, Right to Life, Voice for the Badge, the American Patriot Council, the Michigan Militia, the State Policy Network, Moral Majority, the Heritage Foundation, the Council for National Policy, Turning Point USA, etc. These groups have very clear ideologies and are often well funded to spew their hate and misinformation.

However, while we definitely should be paying attention to people like Calvin Robinson, we should also be thinking about and paying attention to the religious leaders that remain neutral. Ask yourself, with everything that is happening in this world and in the US, why are there so many religious leaders that are not speaking out? How is it that religious leaders can remain silent on the genocide in Gaza, the climate catastrophe, poverty, militarism, white supremacy, trans-phobia, xenophobia, and capitalism, to name just a few. 

How is it that religious leaders can be so married to business as usual, to not rocking the boat, to maintaining order, or to not challenging systems of power and oppression. In some ways it is easy to stand back and condemn the likes of Calvin Robinson, but ignore all the clergy that don’t want to take a prophetic stand on the most pressing issues of the day. 

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. said, “There comes a time when silence is betrayal.” Indeed, being silent in the face of oppression is betrayal, but Dr. King had a much more poignant take on who he thought was more dangerous than the KKK.

While sitting in a jail cell in Birmingham, Alabama, Dr. King wrote a letter to local clergy, stating:

“First, I must confess that over the last few years I have been gravely disappointed with the white moderate. I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro’s great stumbling block in the stride toward freedom is not the White Citizen’s Council-er or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate who is more devoted to “order” than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice; who constantly says “I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I can’t agree with your methods of direct action;” who paternalistically feels he can set the timetable for another man’s freedom; who lives by the myth of time and who constantly advises the Negro to wait until a “more convenient season.

Shallow understanding from people of goodwill is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will. Lukewarm acceptance is much more bewildering than outright rejection.”

It is time that we all begin to engage in some self-examination regarding Dr. King’s words. It’s time that we become more frustrated and angered by the clergy and other so-called leaders who too committed to maintaining order and business as usual politics. It is time we practice radical imagination and collective liberation.