A self-styled visionary who drew hundreds of devotees to a community near Rome by asserting that a figure of the Virgin Mary shed tears of blood has been ordered to stand trial for alleged deception.
Central Accusations and Details
Gisella Cardia, who also stated the figure was sending messages to her, will be tried together with her husband, Gianni Cardia, in the spring next year.
They are accused of staging fake visions of the Virgin Mary and making false forecasts of disasters to attract contributions from their religious supporters.
Cardia drew hundreds of people monthly to Trevignano Romano, a scenic town near Rome, to pray before the statue, which had been placed in a temporary shrine on a elevation. Over a number of years, the supposed scam generated €365,000 in donations from the visitors, who trusted their money would go towards setting up a centre for sick children.
Additional Claims
Cardia is also charged with making false predictions, including stating the figure alerted her that the devil was planning disasters, for example an earthquake that would devastate Rome and the seizure of the Catholic church by communism.
Legal authorities in the coastal city of Civitavecchia initiated an investigation in 2023 after a detective claimed the substance on the figure came from a pig. Cardia was later declared a deceiver by the Catholic church, which afterward tightened its rules on supernatural occurrences as part of a campaign on scams and hoaxes.
“Despite the irony, she finds comfort, viewing this as a chance to clarify the facts openly and conclusively stop all rumors, confusion, and disputes,” said her legal representative, the attorney.
Context and Connected Incidents
Cardia, who has a previous conviction for bankruptcy fraud, purchased the figure in 2016 at a Catholic holy place 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 alleged to have shown himself to a woman 49 times requesting that a “magnificent crucifix” that would ensure the purification of sin be built in the town. The office announced that the claimed 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 redeem the world from sin. His intervention was intended to counter the spread of an extreme worship of the Madonna, often on online platforms, that has encouraged claims of apparitions, weeping figures, and self-styled prophets.
The former Pope Francis warned in 2023 that apparitions of Mary “are not always real”.
