A self-styled mystic who drew many of devotees to a community near Rome by asserting that a figure of the Virgin Mary wept tears of blood has been sent to trial for suspected deception.
Central Accusations and Details
Gisella Cardia, who also claimed the statue was sending messages to her, will be tried along with her husband, Gianni Cardia, in April next year.
They are charged with orchestrating false visions of the Virgin Mary and issuing untrue predictions of disasters to solicit contributions from their Catholic supporters.
Cardia brought hundreds of people monthly to Trevignano Romano, a scenic town near Rome, to pray before the statue, which had been placed in a temporary shrine on a elevation. Over several years, the supposed scam collected a large sum in donations from the visitors, who trusted their funds would go towards establishing a facility for sick children.
Additional Claims
Cardia is also charged with issuing untrue prophecies, including stating the figure warned her that the evil was planning disasters, for example an tremor that would devastate Rome and the takeover of the Catholic church by communism.
Prosecutors in the port city of Civitavecchia initiated an inquiry in 2023 after a detective claimed the substance on the statue originated from a animal. Cardia was later labeled a deceiver by the Catholic church, which afterward strengthened its rules on paranormal occurrences as part of a campaign on scams and deceptions.
“Despite the irony, she finds comfort, viewing this as a chance to clarify the facts openly and conclusively stop all rumors, confusion, and disputes,” stated her legal representative, the attorney.
Context and Connected Events
Cardia, who has a previous sentence for financial crime, bought the statue in 2016 at a Catholic holy place in Međugorje.
Reports of the case came as the Vatican’s religious authority declared that alleged apparitions of Jesus in the French town of Dozulé in the 1970s were not of supernatural origin. Jesus was alleged to have shown himself to a woman 49 times asking that a “magnificent crucifix” that would guarantee the purification of sin be constructed in the town. The authority announced that the alleged apparitions were “finally judged to be non-miraculous”.
Pope Leo approved a ruling last week directing Catholics not to call Mary as the “joint savior”, that is to say that she assisted her son Jesus save the world from damnation. His intervention was intended to counter the spread of an exaggerated veneration of the Madonna, often on online platforms, that has encouraged assertions of apparitions, weeping figures, and self-styled seers.
The late pope cautioned in 2023 that apparitions of Mary “do not always occur”.
