BRUSSELS (AFP) — Pope Francis was challenged by Belgian students Saturday about women’s place in the Catholic Church, after paying tribute to a former sovereign who took a public stance against abortion.

The scripted yet frank exchange at a university in French-speaking Wallonia came after the 87-year-old pontiff was pressed on the issue of child sexual abuse, on day two of a visit partly clouded by past scandals.

In a letter on climate and development issues, read out loud to the pope, the Louvain-la-Neuve students questioned him on the Church’s historical part in entrenching female subservience, the unfair division of labor and even disproportionate female poverty.

“Throughout the history of the Church, women have been made invisible,” the letter read. “What place, then, for women in the Church?”

Francis replied by saying the Church was female, noting that the Italian word for it, “chiesa,” is a feminine noun.

“A woman within the People of God is a daughter, a sister, a mother,” he said, adding “womanhood speaks to us of fruitful welcome, nurturing and life-giving dedication.”

He did not give any details about potential plans for reform.

His response did little to satisfy critics. In a statement issued shortly after the exchange, the university expressed its “incomprehension and disapproval” at his stance.

“We are really shocked,” said Valentine Hendrix, a 22-year-old student. “He reduces us to a role of childbearer, mother, wife, everything we want to emancipate ourselves from.”

Jean-Pascal van Ypersele, a climatologist at UCLouvain university, said Francis had “failed to rise to the occasion.”

“To reply that the Church is a woman is really missing the point of the question — about the Church’s respect for women and their role in the institution and in society,” he said.