A self-styled visionary who attracted many of devotees to a town near Rome by claiming that a statue of the Virgin Mary shed bloody tears has been sent to trial for alleged fraud.
Central Accusations and Details
Gisella Cardia, who also claimed the statue was sending messages to her, will be prosecuted along with her husband, Gianni Cardia, in the spring next year.
They are charged with orchestrating fake apparitions of the Virgin Mary and making false forecasts of disasters to solicit donations from their religious followers.
Cardia drew many of individuals each month to Trevignano Romano, a scenic town near Rome, to worship before the statue, which had been placed in a makeshift sanctuary on a elevation. Over a number of years, the supposed scam generated €365,000 in offerings from the pilgrims, who believed their funds would go towards setting up a centre for sick children.
Further Allegations
Cardia is also accused of making untrue predictions, including stating the figure warned her that the evil was planning disasters, for example an tremor that would destroy Rome and the seizure of the Catholic church by political ideology.
Prosecutors in the coastal city of Civitavecchia initiated an investigation in 2023 after a detective asserted the blood on the figure came from a animal. Cardia was later labeled a deceiver by the Catholic church, which afterward tightened its regulations on supernatural occurrences as part of a crackdown 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,” said her legal representative, the attorney.
Context and Connected Events
The accused, who has a prior sentence for bankruptcy fraud, purchased the figure in 2016 at a Catholic pilgrimage site in Međugorje.
Reports of the trial came as the Vatican’s doctrinal office stated that alleged visions of Jesus in the European town of Dozulé in the 1970s were not of supernatural origin. Jesus was said to have shown himself to a woman 49 times requesting that a “glorious cross” that would guarantee the purification of sin be built in the town. The office announced that the alleged visions were “finally judged to be non-miraculous”.
Pope Leo authorized a ruling last week directing Catholics not to call Mary as the “co-redeemer”, that is to say that she helped her son Jesus save the world from damnation. His action was intended to combat the proliferation of an extreme veneration of the Madonna, often on social media, that has encouraged claims of apparitions, crying figures, and self-styled prophets.
The late pope cautioned in 2023 that appearances of Mary “are not always real”.
