A self-styled visionary who attracted hundreds of pilgrims to a community 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 Details
Gisella Cardia, who also claimed the figure was sending messages to her, will be tried together with her husband, Gianni Cardia, in the spring the coming year.
They are accused of staging false visions of the Virgin Mary and issuing false predictions of catastrophes to attract contributions from their religious followers.
Cardia drew hundreds of people monthly to Trevignano Romano, a lakeside town near Rome, to worship before the figure, which had been positioned in a temporary shrine on a elevation. Over a number of years, the alleged scheme collected a large sum in offerings from the visitors, who believed their money would go towards setting up a centre for ill children.
Further Claims
Cardia is also accused of making untrue prophecies, including stating the statue alerted her that the evil was planning calamities, for example an tremor that would destroy Rome and the seizure of the Catholic church by communism.
Legal authorities in the port city of Civitavecchia initiated an inquiry in 2023 after a detective claimed the substance on the figure originated from a pig. Cardia was later declared a deceiver by the Catholic church, which afterward strengthened 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 Cardia’s lawyer, Solange Marchingoli.
Context and Related Incidents
The accused, who has a previous sentence for bankruptcy fraud, bought the figure in 2016 at a Catholic pilgrimage site in Međugorje.
News of the case came as the Vatican’s religious authority declared that alleged apparitions of Jesus in the French town of Dozulé in the 1970s were deemed non-miraculous. Jesus was alleged to have appeared to a woman 49 times requesting that a “magnificent crucifix” that would guarantee the cleansing of sin be built in the town. The office announced that the alleged apparitions were “finally judged to be non-miraculous”.
The pontiff approved a ruling last week directing Catholics not to call Mary as the “joint savior”, that is to say that she assisted her son Jesus save the world from sin. His intervention was intended to counter the spread of an exaggerated worship of the Madonna, often on social media, that has emboldened assertions of apparitions, weeping figures, and so-called prophets.
The former Pope Francis cautioned in 2023 that appearances of Mary “do not always occur”.
