Giuliani’s ‘Catholic campaigning’ problematic, says Village Voice

Jun 28, 2007 / 09:28 am

A recent article in New York’s Village Voice claims that Rudy Giuliani is using his Catholicity to gain political advantage in his current campaign for Republican presidential candidate.

“Giuliani has only struck a public Catholic pose when it has suited him politically,” the article claims. The article offers an analysis of Giuliani’s about-face regarding his Catholic faith in relation to his current campaign, pointing out the contradictions between his current campaign and his track record as New York City mayor.

For example, Giuliani is currently saying that he hates abortion and is committed to decreasing the number of abortions. He has even said that it would be “okay to repeal” Roe v. Wade. However, while mayor of New York, he hosted three anniversary celebrations at City Hall for the landmark decision that legalized abortion in the United States.

Giuliani also appointed Pam Maraldo, the president of the Planned Parenthood Federation of America, to the city's four-member Board of Health. City records indicate that Giuliani's health and youth agencies awarded more than $2 million in contracts to Planned Parenthood's New York City branch over the years, the Village Voice reports.

The magazine also notes that while the mayor cut the city's welfare rolls, he found millions of dollars in city funds “to subsidize abortions for women whose incomes were too high to meet eligibility standards.”
 
“His wholesale reversal on Medicaid funding, late-term abortions, and parental consent are all part of a repackaging designed to soften not just his New York public record, but also the inconvenient details of his personal life,” the article claims.

“It's impossible to reconcile that [mayoral] record with Giuliani's presidential pose on abortion, just as it's impossible to match his Catholic candidacy with his marital history,” the article states.

The magazine points out that Giuliani has been married three times. Giuliani divorced his second wife after 18 years and remarried in a civil ceremony, clearly outside of the norms of the Catholic Church, the New York magazine notes.

“The question is: Can Giuliani run for president as a Catholic, identifying with the swing vote that has picked the winner in virtually every modern presidential race, when he is so out of step with the Church's code of personal conduct?” the magazine asks.

The article also focuses on Giuliani’s close friendship with a priest accused of sex abuse. His first 14-year marriage was annulled thanks to his close friend, Msgr. Alan Placa, who has since been defrocked due to allegations of sex abuse of four minors, says the Village Voice. A lawyer by training, Placa was hired as a three-day-a-week consultant at Giuliani Partners, where he remains today, the magazine reports. Placa had also baptized Giuliani’s children.

Village Voice offers a lengthy exposé on Placa’s personality, based on testimonies, and on how he helped cover up incidents of sex abuse of minors by his fellow priests while in a position of authority at the diocese.

The hiring of Placa and the passage of a bill, which forces public schools to report abuse complaints to law enforcement as soon as they are received but exempt private schools from this same requirement, shows that “Giuliani's tone-deaf response to sex-abuse issues,” the article states.

Giuliani is also reversing himself on gay issues, rejecting any attempt to welcome gay men into the military, the article notes.