A so-called mystic who drew many of devotees to a community near Rome by claiming that a figure of the Virgin Mary wept tears of blood has been ordered to stand trial for alleged deception.
Key Charges and Details
Gisella Cardia, who also claimed the figure was transmitting messages to her, will be tried together with her spouse, Gianni Cardia, in April next year.
They are charged with staging fake visions of the Virgin Mary and making untrue forecasts of catastrophes to solicit donations from their Catholic followers.
Cardia drew many of individuals monthly to Trevignano Romano, a scenic town near Rome, to worship before the figure, which had been positioned in a temporary shrine on a elevation. Over a number of years, the alleged scheme collected a large sum in donations from the pilgrims, who trusted their funds would go towards setting up a centre for sick children.
Further Allegations
Cardia is also accused of issuing false prophecies, including stating the statue warned her that the evil was planning disasters, for example an earthquake that would devastate Rome and the takeover of the Catholic church by political ideology.
Legal authorities in the port city of Civitavecchia opened an investigation in 2023 after a private investigator asserted the blood on the statue came from a animal. Cardia was later declared a fraud by the Catholic church, which afterward strengthened its regulations on paranormal phenomena as part of a campaign on scams 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,” stated her legal representative, Solange Marchingoli.
Background and Connected Events
Cardia, who has a previous sentence for financial crime, bought the statue in 2016 at a Catholic holy place in Bosnia and Herzegovina.
News of the case came as the Vatican’s doctrinal office 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 appeared to Madeleine Aumont 49 times requesting that a “magnificent crucifix” that would ensure the purification of sin be built in the town. The authority announced that the claimed apparitions were “considered, definitively, as not supernatural in origin”.
Pope Leo approved a ruling last week instructing Catholics not to call Mary as the “joint savior”, that is to say that she helped her son Jesus redeem the world from damnation. His action was aimed to counter the spread of an extreme worship of the Madonna, often on social media, that has encouraged claims of visions, crying statues, and self-styled seers.
The former Pope Francis warned in 2023 that apparitions of Mary “are not always real”.
