Pope Francis had said that abortion is murder.
De Croo summoned the papal nuncio to express his displeasure with the Pope’s statement.
Addressing parliament, he said: “A foreign head of state making such a statement about the democratic decision-making process in our country is absolutely unacceptable.”
De Croo said that “the time when the church dictated the law in our country is long behind us.”
He went on to repeat his criticism of the Church for its handling of the sex-abuse scandal, saying: “If there should be outrage about anything, it is towards those who, for example, allowed sexual harassment to take place, or towards those who failed to act when action should have been taken.”