Sydney  - Attorney-General Rob Hulls, the highest law officer in the Australian state of Victoria, was refused communion at a Christmas Eve Catholic mass at his church because his government legalized abortion, a newspaper reported on Wednesday.

A minister assisting a priest in a children's mass at St Monica's Church in Moonee Ponds, Melbourne, placed his hand over the communion cup when Hulls approached the altar with his children in his arms, the Herald Sun newspaper reported.