PORTLAND – The spiritual leader of Maine’s 234,000 Roman Catholics has never denied Holy Communion to anyone – and he doesn’t intend to start now.

That includes elected officials who don’t vote according to church teachings on controversial issues such as abortion and assisted suicide, Bishop Richard Malone said recently.

“When a politician is receiving the Eucharist is not ordinarily the time to make judgments about a person’s worthiness,” he said. “No one who is distributing Holy Communion can see into the depths of a person’s conscience … Denial of the Eucharist is not necessarily the most prudent way to oppose the assault on the unborn.”

Malone was one of 183 bishops who voted for the statement released last month in Denver after the annual meeting of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, said Sue Bernard, spokeswoman for the Roman Catholic Diocese of Portland, which comprises all of Maine’s parishes.

In their statement, the bishops declared that politicians who support legal abortion are “cooperating in evil” and should not be given “awards, honors or platforms that would suggest support for their actions.” They stopped short of saying that such politicians should be turned away from Communion, leaving intact the status quo, which is that each bishop is free to set the policy in his diocese.

Though adopted nearly unanimously, the statement has neither quelled the debate nor produced unity among the bishops themselves.

Some, such as Archbishop Raymond L. Burke of St. Louis, continue to say that Democratic presidential candidate John F. Kerry, a senator from Massachusetts, and other Catholic politicians who support abortion rights should be denied Communion. Others, such as Cardinal Roger M. Mahony of Los Angeles, say that whether to receive Communion should be left to each Catholic’s conscience.

Polls show that most Catholics, including a majority of those who attend Mass at least once a week, agree with Mahony’s position.

The controversy, fueled by Kerry’s run for president, is not a new one for Malone, installed on March 31 as the 11th bishop of Maine. A Beverly, Mass., native, Malone, 58, was ordained a priest in 1972 and spent his entire career in and around Boston, where he was elevated to auxiliary bishop in 2000.

The issue has simmered for years in heavily Catholic Massachusetts, partly because of Democratic Sen. Edward M. Kennedy’s long career and pro-choice voting record, according to Malone.

Maine’s bishop and the state’s Catholic governor, John Baldacci, agree with the cardinal.

“There’s a separation of church and state; the country was founded on religious freedoms,” Baldacci said earlier this year. “I feel very strongly about that, and I remember how fierce President Kennedy had to be on that issue. The practice of Catholicism is something I try to practice not one day a week, but every day of the week. … I plan to [take Communion] when I attend Mass.”

Malone also said that while he and a majority of bishops do not want to sanction politicians for their voting records, the fact that Catholic lawmakers cast votes in opposition to church teachings is “very frustrating.”

While in Denver, Malone also voted with a majority of bishops to continue audits of dioceses to determine whether they are in compliance with the provisions of the mandatory policy adopted to prevent sexual abuse of minors by priests. The bishop said that if the provision had not passed, he would have continued the annual audit in Maine.

Auditors are expected to visit Maine this fall, according to Bernard.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.