A so-called mystic who drew hundreds of pilgrims to a town near Rome by asserting that a statue of the Virgin Mary wept tears of blood has been sent to trial for suspected fraud.
Key Accusations and Details
Gisella Cardia, who also claimed the figure was sending communications to her, will be tried together with her husband, Gianni Cardia, in April the coming year.
They are charged with orchestrating fake visions of the Virgin Mary and making false forecasts of catastrophes to attract donations from their religious followers.
Cardia drew many of people monthly to Trevignano Romano, a scenic town near Rome, to worship before the statue, which had been placed in a temporary shrine on a hill. Over several years, the supposed scheme generated €365,000 in offerings from the pilgrims, who believed their funds would go towards establishing a facility for sick children.
Further Claims
Cardia is also charged with making false predictions, including stating the statue warned her that the evil was concocting disasters, for example an tremor that would destroy Rome and the seizure of the Catholic church by communism.
Legal authorities in the coastal city of Civitavecchia initiated an inquiry in 2023 after a private investigator asserted the substance on the figure originated from a pig. Cardia was later declared a fraud by the Catholic church, which subsequently strengthened its rules on supernatural occurrences as part of a crackdown on frauds and deceptions.
“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 Cardia’s lawyer, Solange Marchingoli.
Context and Connected Incidents
Cardia, who has a previous conviction for bankruptcy fraud, bought the statue in 2016 at a Catholic pilgrimage site in Međugorje.
Reports of the trial came as the Vatican’s religious authority 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 asking that a “magnificent crucifix” that would ensure the purification of sin be constructed in the town. The authority said that the alleged apparitions were “finally judged to be non-miraculous”.
The pontiff authorized a decree 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 spread of an extreme worship of the Madonna, often on social media, that has emboldened claims of apparitions, crying figures, and so-called prophets.
The late pope cautioned in 2023 that apparitions of Mary “do not always occur”.
