A so-called visionary who drew many of devotees to a community near Rome by claiming that a figure of the Virgin Mary shed tears of blood has been sent to trial for alleged fraud.
Central Charges and Particulars
Gisella Cardia, who also stated the figure was transmitting communications to her, will be tried along with her spouse, Gianni Cardia, in April the coming year.
They are charged with staging fake visions of the Virgin Mary and issuing false predictions of catastrophes to solicit contributions from their religious supporters.
Cardia brought hundreds of individuals each month to Trevignano Romano, a scenic town near Rome, to pray before the statue, which had been positioned in a temporary sanctuary on a hill. Over several years, the alleged scheme generated €365,000 in offerings from the visitors, who trusted their money would go towards establishing a centre for ill children.
Further Allegations
Cardia is also accused of issuing false predictions, including claiming the statue alerted her that the devil was planning disasters, for example an tremor that would destroy Rome and the takeover of the Catholic church by political ideology.
Prosecutors in the port city of Civitavecchia initiated an investigation in 2023 after a detective claimed the substance on the figure originated from a animal. Cardia was later declared a fraud by the Catholic church, which afterward tightened its rules on paranormal occurrences as part of a crackdown 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, Solange Marchingoli.
Context and Related Incidents
Cardia, who has a previous conviction for bankruptcy fraud, bought the statue in 2016 at a Catholic pilgrimage site in Bosnia and Herzegovina.
News of the case 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 appeared to Madeleine Aumont 49 times requesting that a “magnificent crucifix” that would ensure the purification of sin be constructed in the town. The office announced that the claimed apparitions were “considered, definitively, as not supernatural in origin”.
The pontiff approved a ruling last week directing Catholics not to call Mary as the “co-redeemer”, that is to say that she assisted her son Jesus redeem the world from sin. His action was aimed to counter the proliferation of an extreme worship of the Madonna, often on online platforms, that has emboldened claims of apparitions, weeping statues, and so-called prophets.
The former Pope Francis warned in 2023 that apparitions of Mary “do not always occur”.
