A self-styled mystic who drew many of pilgrims to a town near Rome by asserting that a statue of the Virgin Mary shed bloody tears has been sent to trial for suspected deception.
Central Accusations and Particulars
Gisella Cardia, who also claimed the statue was transmitting communications to her, will be prosecuted together with her spouse, Gianni Cardia, in the spring the coming year.
They are accused of orchestrating fake visions of the Virgin Mary and issuing untrue predictions of catastrophes to attract donations from their religious followers.
Cardia drew many of people each month to Trevignano Romano, a scenic town near Rome, to pray before the statue, which had been placed in a temporary sanctuary on a hill. Over several years, the supposed scheme generated €365,000 in offerings from the pilgrims, who trusted their funds would go towards setting up a facility for sick children.
Additional Claims
Cardia is also charged with issuing false predictions, including stating the statue warned her that the devil was planning calamities, for example an earthquake that would devastate Rome and the seizure of the Catholic church by political ideology.
Legal authorities in the coastal city of Civitavecchia opened an investigation in 2023 after a private investigator asserted the blood on the figure came from a animal. Cardia was later labeled a fraud by the Catholic church, which afterward tightened its regulations on paranormal occurrences as part of a crackdown on scams 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,” said her legal representative, the attorney.
Background and Related Incidents
Cardia, who has a prior 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 doctrinal office declared that alleged apparitions of Jesus in the European town of Dozulé in the 1970s were deemed non-miraculous. Jesus was alleged to have appeared to Madeleine Aumont 49 times requesting that a “magnificent crucifix” that would guarantee the purification of sin be constructed in the town. The office announced that the claimed visions were “finally judged to be non-miraculous”.
The pontiff authorized a ruling last week instructing 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 intervention was intended to combat the proliferation of an exaggerated veneration of the Madonna, often on online platforms, that has encouraged assertions of visions, weeping figures, and self-styled seers.
The former Pope Francis cautioned in 2023 that apparitions of Mary “do not always occur”.
