The Anglican Catholic Church revoked the ministerial license of a Michigan priest who mimicked Elon Musk’s controversial straight arm salute.
Musk performed the gesture, resembling the Nazi salute, twice earlier this month during a speech at a Donald Trump inauguration event.
Father Calvin Robinson, the priest-in-charge of St. Paul’s Anglican Catholic Church in Grand Rapids, Michigan, performed the same gesture at the end of his speech at the National Pro-Life summit in Washington, D.C. on Jan. 25.
In a statement on Wednesday, the Anglican Catholic Church said Robinson’s “license in this Church has been revoked” after he made a “gesture that many have interpreted as a pro-Nazi salute.”
“While we cannot say what was in Mr. Robinson’s heart when he did this, his action appears to have been an attempt to curry favour with certain elements of the American political right by provoking its opposition,” the statement continued.
“Mr. Robinson had been warned that online trolling and other such actions (whether in service of the left or right) are incompatible with a priestly vocation and was told to desist. Clearly, he has not, and as such, his license in this Church has been revoked,” it added. “He is no longer serving as a priest in the ACC.”
