Health-care forum panelists, from left, Rep. Patrick Kennedy, Erin Kelly, a medical school student, and Vincent Mor, Department of Community Health chairman, listen to an opening speaker at Brown University on Monday night. The Providence Journal / Connie Grosch

PROVIDENCE — U.S. Rep. Patrick J. Kennedy on Monday tackled scholarly questions about health care, but sidestepped queries about his feud with Providence’s Roman Catholic bishop in his first public appearance since asserting that Bishop Thomas Tobin told him not to take Communion because of his position on abortion.

As one of four panelists at a long-planned Brown University forum on health care, Kennedy dominated a 90-minute discussion before an audience of more than 150 doctors, students and others of how best to change the nation’s system.

But the interest in Kennedy’s public disagreement with the bishop remains so intense that seven television cameras and 13 media representatives from Providence and Boston as well as a New York Times reporter attended an event that would otherwise attract little notice. When it ended, Kennedy joked, “I’m so glad that all of you are so interested in health care.”

The issue of abortion came up only during a question-and-answer period, when Christopher Young, a perennial, conservative candidate for elective office, accused Kennedy of supporting a health-care bill that “funds abortions.”

Police remove Christopher Young from the Brown University forum after he disrupted it by shouting at Rep. Patrick Kennedy about his stance on abortion. AP / Steven Senne

Young left the microphone and approached Kennedy at the head of the room as the police scrambled to intercept him. Before they arrived, Young tossed a DVD on the table in front of the congressman, which was quickly confiscated by the police. Young returned to the microphone and refused to stop speaking.

“You’re not Catholic if you force Catholics into funding abortion,” he yelled.

A small team of Brown University police officers dragged him from the crowded room in Andrews Hall. Young was charged with disorderly conduct and resisting arrest, and turned over to Providence police, according to the university.

Kennedy never addressed Young’s comments, because even as cameras filmed Young being handcuffed on the floor of the vestibule, a Brown student calmly took the microphone and posed a question about the pricing of medical services.

After the panel discussion, Kennedy briefly took questions from the media. He said he wasn’t threatened by Young’s outburst. “I think that’s part of the whole process of politics these days,” Kennedy said. “I think at the end of the day, the American people are really exhausted by the debate by the extremes.”

Asked whether he would consider leaving the church given Tobin’s criticism, Kennedy responded: “These are personal issues of faith for me. I’m not going to indulge in this debate any more. It’s really, for me, about what my constituents are most interested in now, and that is getting a health-care bill passed that helps improve their lives.”

Kennedy was locked in a public feud with Bishop Tobin last week that originated when the congressman criticized the Catholic Church’s push to eliminate public funding of abortion in health-care legislation moving through Congress.

Meanwhile, Kennedy has received at least one invitation to join another church. The Rev. James Ishmael Ford, of the First Unitarian Church of Providence, on Monday released a letter to Kennedy that begins, “I am under the impression you may be church shopping.” In urging Kennedy to consider joining, the letter says that the Unitarian church shares the Catholic Church’s commitment to protecting the powerless, but also supports the rights of women and gays.

Even during the panel discussion, religion seemed to seep into Kennedy’s speech as he framed the health-care debate as a “moral issue” and decried a system “where some people matter more than others.” Everyone has a right to the best possible health care, he said, because “All of us are children of God. All of us have the spark of divinity.”

The forum was the last of three lectures at Brown on health care. In addition to Kennedy, it featured Dr. Edward J. Wing, dean of medicine and biological sciences; Vincent Mor, chairman of the department of community health; and Erin Kelly, a Brown medical student.

But much of the discussion came from the audience. Samuel H. Havens, a member of the board of directors of Blue Cross & Blue Shield of Rhode Island, asked why none of the health-care proposals promote wellness or include measures to increase the number of primary-care doctors. Kennedy blamed the political process and the difficulty of bringing about any change at all.

Don Murphy, a chiropractor, said that “all the evidence points to the fact that less is more.” When it comes to back pain, he said, “teaching people how to take care of themselves” is cheaper and more effective than tests and treatments, and yet providers make more money if they do more procedures. The health-care bill, Murphy said to applause, doesn’t focus on paying only for what works best and instead would “pay for the same inefficient care, but try to pay less for it.”

“You’ve hit the nail on the head,” Kennedy replied. “The system responds to the political influence of money.” But now, he said, the high cost of health insurance has provided a countervailing force as businesses start to demand “Let’s get more for our dollar.”

Kennedy moved from the public discussion at Brown to a crowded private fundraiser at the Hi-Hat in Davol Square. The suggested donation was $100.

The eight-term congressman will face at least one challenger in November, Republican state Rep. John J. Loughlin II, of Tiverton, (who attended the Brown forum but did not speak publicly).

The fundraiser was hosted by a committee that included much of Rhode Island’s Democratic establishment, such as party Chairman William Lynch, former lieutenant governors Charles J. Fogarty and Richard Licht, and AFL-CIO President George Nee.

speoples@projo.com