A dozen people picketed the Downtown headquarters of the Catholic Diocese of Pittsburgh yesterday, calling on Bishop Donald Wuerl to deny communion to Catholic legislators who support legal abortion.

The protesters held signs denouncing abortion and the voting record of Sen. John Kerry, the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee. Kerry, a staunch backer of abortion rights, has received communion at least twice at local parishes.

In a speech last month, Wuerl said sacramental sanctions are the wrong response.

"It has been the long tradition of the church, not just a matter of Bishop Wuerl's position, that the person who presents himself or herself for communion has the primary responsibility to determine whether or not they are worthy to receive it," said the Rev. Ronald Lengwin, Wuerl's spokesman. "The condition of their soul is between them and God."

Yesterday's protest occurred as a conservative national anti-abortion group ran an ad in USA Today, urging the bishops to withhold communion from abortion rights legislators. The American Life League, which sponsored the ad, often takes positions on civil legislation that are more uncompromising than those of the National Right to Life Committee or the U.S. Catholic Bishops.

There are signs that Wuerl's position could emerge as the consensus of the U.S. bishops. He is at a closed meeting of the bishops in Denver, which is billed as a retreat but is expected to produce discussion of guidelines on the communion issue.

A few of the 200 diocesan bishops have banned legislators who support abortion from communion.

However, recently, U.S. bishops returning from Rome have said that Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, head of the Vatican's Congregation for the Doctrine of Faith, advised caution about using such sanctions.

Wuerl's speech is also in line with statements from Cardinal Theodore McCarrick of Washington, D.C., head of the task force drafting the guidelines.

Wuerl said that a bishop's first duty is to teach why abortion is wrong, but that a Catholic legislator who persisted in voting for it could reasonably expect to be banned from speaking at or receiving awards from Catholic institutions. The crux of the disagreement between Wuerl and the pickets concerns the interpretation and application of canon 915, which says that those "who obstinately persist in manifest grave sin are not to be admitted to Holy Communion."

"If you publicly advocate abortion, that is what that would be, and you would not be in communion with the Catholic Church," said Mary Kay Brown of Dorseyville, a protester and local coordinator for Operation Witness.

But Wuerl's speech argues that canon law must be interpreted in the light of the church's official theology. The Catechism of the Catholic Church teaches that for a person to be considered in grave or mortal sin, not only does their action have to be evil, but their objective must be to commit such a sin, and they must do so in full knowledge of the sinfulness of their action and its consequences, he argued.

"Given the long-standing practice of not making a public judgment about the state of the soul of those who present themselves for Holy Communion, it does not seem that it is sufficiently clear that in the matter of voting for legislation that supports abortion such a judgment [of mortal sin] necessarily follows."

Helen Cindrich, president of People Concerned for the Unborn Child, the major anti-abortion group in Western Pennsylvania, empathized with the protesters' feelings, but supported Wuerl's principles. She noted that Pope John Paul II gives communion to everyone who comes forward.

"These are people who love the church and feel very strongly about this issue," she said of the protesters. "But none of us is worthy to receive [communion]. The sacrament should not be used as a political tool."