A so-called visionary who drew hundreds of devotees to a town near Rome by claiming that a figure of the Virgin Mary wept tears of blood has been sent to trial for suspected deception.
Key Accusations and Details
The accused woman, who also stated the statue was transmitting messages to her, will be prosecuted along with her spouse, Gianni Cardia, in the spring next year.
They are accused of orchestrating false apparitions of the Virgin Mary and making false forecasts of disasters to solicit contributions from their Catholic supporters.
Cardia drew many of individuals monthly to a lakeside town, a lakeside town near Rome, to pray before the figure, which had been positioned in a temporary shrine on a hill. Over several years, the alleged scam generated €365,000 in offerings from the visitors, who trusted their money would go towards setting up a centre for sick children.
Further Allegations
Cardia is also accused of making false predictions, including stating the figure warned her that the evil was planning calamities, for example an earthquake that would destroy Rome and the seizure of the Catholic church by political ideology.
Prosecutors in the port city of Civitavecchia initiated an inquiry in 2023 after a detective 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 paranormal phenomena 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 her legal representative, the attorney.
Background and Connected Incidents
Cardia, who has a prior conviction for bankruptcy fraud, bought the statue in 2016 at a religious holy place in Bosnia and Herzegovina.
News of the trial came as the Vatican’s doctrinal office declared that supposed apparitions of Jesus in the European town of Dozulé in the 1970s were deemed non-miraculous. Jesus was alleged to have shown himself to a woman 49 times asking that a “glorious cross” that would ensure the cleansing of sin be built 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 refer to Mary as the “co-redeemer”, that is to say that she assisted her son Jesus redeem the world from damnation. His action was aimed to counter the proliferation of an exaggerated veneration of the Madonna, often on social media, that has emboldened assertions of visions, crying figures, and self-styled seers.
The late Pope Francis cautioned in 2023 that appearances of Mary “are not always real”.
