This is a very difficult question to answer and varies largely depending on the relationship between the Papacy and Monarchy during the specific period. Sometimes these things may be overlooked and left to local officials, other times the papacy may feel that his authority is being challenged.

The papacy faced a continuous battle to assert its supremacy over the kings and princes of Europe during Medieval times and we see phases were certain Popes try to assert what has been coined by historians as 'Papal Monarchy.' One example of this is Gregory IX's excommunication of Frederick II, after accusing him in a letter of October 1227 of persecuting the church in Sicily, denying ecclesiastical liberties and forcing some of the leading ecclesiastics into exile (amongst other things). A new Pope, eager to set the tone for his reign, surrounded by Frederick's increasingly dangeous Empire, it is clear to see why Gregory opted to try to protect the local clergy of Sicily in this instance.

The best example for how the church and monarch might choose to seek concessions from one another, however, is summed up in the relationship between Boniface VIII and Philip IV.

Boniface’s dispute with the French King was born out of the clerical bull Clericis Laiscos (24 February 1296), a move by the church to forbid the contributions of the clergy to secular rulers. Philip responded to the bull by prohibiting the export of money, a move that affected Papal revenue and which Boniface interpreted as a direct attack on his papal authority and the friction between the two grew. However, finding his position in Rome vulnerable after an attack from within Italy on the validity of the abdication of Celestine V, the pope took a new approach to dealing with Philip – appeasement – and a new bull, Etsi de statu (31 July 1297), permitted the King to levy subsidies from the clergy, an allowance which Philip all too often exploited. Even following Philip’s dispute with Bernard Saisset (Bishop of Pamiers), Boniface continued to appease the king and the canonisation of Louis IX was one final gesture of co-operation, perhaps born out of Boniface’s own designs to launch a crusade. Enough was enough however, and the Pope’s temper took hold. As Strayer notes, ‘he may never have said that he “would rather be a dog than a Frenchmen”; the point is people believed that he could say such things’ and the dispute crystalised in 1302 with the infamous Papal Bull Unam Sanctam (18 November 1302).

After all the assertion of authority that was implicit in Philip’s attempt to charge a pope with heresy and depose him (even though frustrated by Boniface’s untimely death) underscored the remarkable religious claims the French crown was making at this time in history. In response, Boniface had tried to make the Papacy’s position clear:

“We must recognize the more clearly that spiritual power surpasses in dignity and in nobility any temporal power… We declare, we proclaim, we define that it is absolutely necessary for salvation that every human creature be subject to the Roman Pontiff… Therefore, of the one and only Church there is one body and one head, not two heads like a monster.”

Sources:

Abulafia, David, Frederick II: A Medieval Emperor (London: Pimlico, 1992)

Strayer, Joseph, The Reign of Philip the Fair (Princeston: Princeston University Press, 1980)

Boniface VIII, “Unam Sanctam 18 November 1302,” in The Medieval Sourcebook, http://www.fordham.edu/Halsall/source/B8-unam.asp