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In what has now become another eruption of outright media hysteria, let us pause for just a moment to revisit a very instructional episode from a few years back involving Pope Francis and some accused priests in Spain.

It was a front page story in the New York Times. In late 2014, responding to an emotional letter he had just received, Pope Francis personally telephoned a 25-year-old man from Spain going by the name of "Daniel." Daniel – whose real name turned out to be David Ramírez Castillo – had written to Francis claiming that he and others had been sexually abused repeatedly years earlier as children by a ring of pedophile priests.

Here were some of the headlines at the time:

"Letter to Pope uncovers pedophile network in Spain" (Cruxnow.com, Nov. 18, 2014);

"Ten Catholic priests are charged with sexually abusing four altar boys in Spain after one of the alleged victims wrote to the Pope" (Daily Mail, Jan. 28, 2015);

"'I Am Father Jorge': Pope Phones A Sex-Abuse Victim and Causes a Stir in Spain" (Aleteia, Nov 20, 2014);

"In Spanish Abuse Scandal, a More Open Vatican," (NYT (front page), Feb. 14, 2015).

Acting upon Francis's urging, Spanish law enforcement promptly launched a criminal investigation and soon claimed that it had "uncovered a criminal network of pedophiles that involves at least 12 people among priests and laity from different parishes in the Spanish city of Granada."

And if there were still any doubt about the veracity of the accusations, the Times made sure to report that Castillo's abuse was "supported by one other plaintiff as well as by several witnesses." Indeed, some ten priests were indicted for either abusing Castillo or "covering up" the priests' alleged crimes.

Then came the truth

In the end, however, Castillo's entire claim turned out to be completely bogus. None of the abuse that attracted the Pope's personal attention and international headlines was true. Nada. It was all a crock.

In 2017, three years after the original accusations, a Spanish court issued an exhaustive 81-page ruling exonerating all of the accused priests. The report explained that Castillo's accusations were not just false for a lack of evidence, but they also were "completely implausible" as well as "contradictory, hesitant and uncorroborated." The court's report also listed several events and details from the accuser that were proved to be outright false.

Remember: the New York Times had published the claim that there were "several witnesses" to the abuse. But there weren't any. It was complete bunk. The reputations of numerous Spanish priests were shattered by the Times and others. For a reason God only knows, the accuser made the whole story up.

Michael Cook, editor at MercatorNet, has an excellent article with the apt title, "Let's all take a chill pill." "Catholics need to get a grip and take a calmer look at the crisis in their Church," Cook writes. He is exactly right.

Are you listening, Catholic media? Maybe you should remember the case in Spain before mindlessly regurgitating wild claims from the recent Pennsylvania grand jury report about priests sodomizing kids with crucifixes and forcing oral sex. Maybe some of these events didn't happen.