CLAYTON, Mo. — Republican Rudy Giuliani on Thursday brushed aside criticism from Roman Catholic Archbishop Raymond Burke, who said he would deny communion to Giuliani and any other presidential candidate who supports abortion rights.

"I'm not running for religious office," Giuliani told reporters during a brief appearance at a coffee bar in a St. Louis suburb.

"I'm not going to debate the opinion of an archbishop of the Catholic Church or an official of the Protestant Church or a rabbi," Giuliani said. "That's an interpretation of religion. They're entitled to their interpretation of religion."

On Wednesday, Burke, the archbishop of St. Louis, was asked if he would deny communion to Giuliani or any other presidential candidate who favors abortion rights.

"If any politician approached me and he'd been admonished not to present himself, I'd not give it," Burke said. "To me, you have to be certain a person realizes he is persisting in a serious public sin."

Asked if the same would apply to politicians who support the death penalty or pre-emptive war, he said, "It's a little more complicated in that case."

Giuliani, a Catholic, already would not be permitted to receive communion under church law because he has remarried without having his second marriage annulled by the church.

During his stop in Missouri, Giuliani faced questions about his absence from a forum sponsored by the National Urban League in July, and his failure to appear at historically black Morgan State University last month. He cited scheduling conflicts.

"I reach out to white and black, Christian and Jewish and Muslim, and to the nonreligious vote," he said.

Giuliani had little to say about Monsignor Alan Placa, a boyhood friend who works for Giuliani's security consulting business. On Thursday, national advocates for victims of abuse by clergy renewed their call for Giuliani to fire Placa, who has been suspended from the Roman Catholic Church over accusations he abused children and covered up abuse by others.

Placa has defended himself for years over allegations in a 2003 Suffolk County grand jury report that detailed decades-old abuses by priests in the Diocese of Rockville Centre, N.Y.

None of the priests was ever prosecuted because statutes of limitations had expired.