A self-styled visionary who drew many of pilgrims to a community near Rome by claiming that a statue of the Virgin Mary wept bloody tears has been sent to trial for suspected fraud.
Central Accusations and Particulars
Gisella Cardia, who also stated the statue was transmitting communications to her, will be tried along with her spouse, Gianni Cardia, in the spring next year.
They are charged with staging false apparitions of the Virgin Mary and making untrue predictions of catastrophes to solicit donations from their religious followers.
Cardia drew hundreds of people monthly to Trevignano Romano, a scenic town near Rome, to pray before the figure, which had been positioned in a temporary sanctuary on a elevation. Over a number of years, the alleged scheme generated a large sum in offerings from the pilgrims, who believed their funds would go towards establishing a centre for ill children.
Additional Allegations
Cardia is also accused of making false prophecies, including claiming the statue warned her that the devil was concocting calamities, for example an earthquake that would devastate 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 statue came from a animal. Cardia was later declared a fraud by the Catholic church, which subsequently strengthened its regulations on supernatural phenomena as part of a campaign 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 Cardia’s lawyer, Solange Marchingoli.
Context and Connected Events
Cardia, who has a previous conviction for financial crime, bought the figure in 2016 at a Catholic pilgrimage site in Bosnia and Herzegovina.
Reports of the case came as the Vatican’s doctrinal office stated that alleged apparitions of Jesus in the French town of Dozulé in the 1970s were not of supernatural origin. 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 said that the alleged apparitions were “finally judged to be non-miraculous”.
Pope Leo approved a ruling last week directing Catholics not to call Mary as the “co-redeemer”, that is to say that she helped her son Jesus redeem the world from sin. His action was intended to counter the spread of an exaggerated worship of the Madonna, often on online platforms, that has encouraged claims of apparitions, weeping statues, and self-styled seers.
The former Pope Francis warned in 2023 that apparitions of Mary “are not always real”.
