A so-called visionary who drew many of pilgrims to a community near Rome by claiming that a figure of the Virgin Mary shed tears of blood has been ordered to stand trial for suspected deception.
Key Accusations and Particulars
Gisella Cardia, who also stated the statue was sending communications to her, will be tried together with her spouse, Gianni Cardia, in April the coming year.
They are charged with staging false apparitions of the Virgin Mary and making untrue predictions of disasters to solicit contributions from their religious supporters.
Cardia brought hundreds of individuals monthly to Trevignano Romano, a scenic town near Rome, to worship before the figure, which had been positioned in a temporary sanctuary on a hill. Over several years, the supposed scheme collected a large sum in offerings from the pilgrims, who trusted their funds would go towards setting up a centre for sick children.
Additional Claims
Cardia is also charged with issuing untrue prophecies, including stating the statue alerted her that the evil was planning disasters, for example an tremor that would destroy Rome and the takeover of the Catholic church by communism.
Prosecutors in the port city of Civitavecchia opened an investigation in 2023 after a detective asserted the blood on the statue originated from a animal. Cardia was later labeled a deceiver by the Catholic church, which afterward tightened its rules on paranormal phenomena as part of a crackdown on frauds and hoaxes.
“As paradoxical as it may seem, she actually feels relief, believing this is an opportunity to reveal the truth of the events with transparency and to definitively put an end to all forms of speculation, misunderstanding and controversy,” said her legal representative, the attorney.
Background and Related Incidents
The accused, who has a prior conviction for financial crime, bought the statue in 2016 at a religious holy place in Međugorje.
News of the trial came as the Vatican’s religious authority declared that supposed apparitions of Jesus in the French town of Dozulé in the 1970s were deemed non-miraculous. Jesus was said to have shown himself to a woman 49 times asking that a “glorious cross” that would ensure the purification of sin be built in the town. The office said that the alleged apparitions were “considered, definitively, as not supernatural in origin”.
Pope Leo approved a decree last week instructing Catholics not to refer to Mary as the “joint savior”, that is to say that she helped her son Jesus redeem the world from sin. His action was intended to combat the spread of an extreme worship of the Madonna, often on online platforms, that has emboldened assertions of apparitions, weeping figures, and so-called prophets.
The late Pope Francis warned in 2023 that apparitions of Mary “do not always occur”.
