Pope`s `pain` as second man accuses Spanish priests of abuse

SPAIN
Zee News

A second man has filed a complaint accusing a group of Catholic priests in Spain of sexual abuse in a case Pope Francis has said has caused him “great pain”, a judicial source said Wednesday.

Police on Monday arrested three Catholic priests and a religion teacher in the southern city of Granada after a 24-year-old man accused them of molesting him and other children.

Pope Francis said Tuesday he had personally ordered an investigation into a case after the unidentified man sent a letter to the pope telling him of how he had been molested when he was an altar boy.

“I read it. I called the person and I told him, `Go to the bishop tomorrow,` and then I wrote to the bishop and told him to start an investigation,” Francis said in response to a question by a Spanish reporter on his plane from Strasbourg, France, where he had addressed the European Parliament.

“How have I received this news? With great pain, very great pain, but the truth is the truth and we should not hide it.”

A second man presented a formal complaint against the priests and religion teacher at a duty court in Granada on Monday, a judicial source told AFP.

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