The NYObserver takes a good look:

(And by "good" I mean objective and fair. No kidding.)

Rudy Giuliani has made it clear that he doesn’t “get into debates with the pope.”

The Roman Catholic Church, however, is already debating what to do with the likes of Mr. Giuliani.

Pope Benedict XVI and the bishops who run the Catholic Church have a longstanding practice of not directly commenting on the political candidates of any single country. But when presented with Mr. Giuliani’s position on abortion, American Cardinal Edmund Casimir Szoka, the president emeritus of the governatorate of Vatican City State, was clear.

“That’s not very acceptable to us,” said Cardinal Szoka in a phone interview with The Observer. “Because if he says, ‘Well, I’m personally opposed but I believe a woman should have a right to choose,’ well then, how can you be personally opposed? It’s a contradiction.”

Cardinal Walter Kasper, president of the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity and a top Vatican official who is generally considered to have a more liberal outlook, also said in a separate interview that a Catholic politician holding positions like those of Mr. Giuliani—the former Mayor says that he is morally opposed to abortion but supports abortion rights—created a “contradiction.”

“To be pro-choice is directly against the fundamental Catholic position, and I don’t see how it could be possible,” said Cardinal Kasper, who is a member of the Roman Curia, the body that enforces the pope’s policies, shapes the doctrine and runs the government of the Holy See.

“It’s complicated,” he said. “Questions of conscience are always complicated. But if somebody wants to be in public life, as a Catholic, he should also state Catholic positions.”

snip

No matter what conclusion is reached, another question—of equal political significance—is how the church should apply its decision to Catholic elected officials who share Mr. Giuliani’s views. Cardinal Kasper, for example, laughed at the prospect of summarily excommunicating pro-choice Catholic politicians, a policy that would lead to the canonical expulsion of most elected officials in the traditionally Catholic countries of Western Europe.

“I don’t want to excommunicate all types of people,” he said. “But it’s a serious thing. The church has to take serious its own positions. It cannot be without consequence when a Catholic publicly departs from these positions. The church has to take serious its own position.”

That matter will soon come to a head once again in a highly visible debate with consequences for the candidacy of Mr. Giuliani, who is seeking the nomination of a party that has voted in every Presidential election in the past three decades for openly religious Christians. In November, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops will finalize its position on political responsibility for Catholic politicians. And for the first time, the proceedings will be discussed in open session and opened up to the floor, so that any of the roughly 400 bishops can weigh in or propose an amendment to the conference’s statement.