A self-styled visionary who attracted hundreds of devotees to a town near Rome by asserting that a statue of the Virgin Mary shed bloody tears has been ordered to stand trial for suspected fraud.
Central Charges and Details
Gisella Cardia, who also stated the statue was sending communications to her, will be tried along with her spouse, Gianni Cardia, in April next year.
They are charged with orchestrating false apparitions of the Virgin Mary and issuing false predictions of disasters to solicit contributions from their religious followers.
Cardia brought many of individuals monthly to a lakeside town, a lakeside town near Rome, to pray before the statue, which had been positioned in a temporary sanctuary on a elevation. Over a number of years, the supposed scheme collected a large sum in offerings from the visitors, who believed their funds would go towards setting up a facility for sick children.
Further Claims
Cardia is also accused of issuing false predictions, including stating the figure alerted her that the devil was planning calamities, for example an earthquake that would devastate Rome and the takeover of the Catholic church by political ideology.
Legal authorities in the port 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 fraud by the Catholic church, which subsequently strengthened its regulations on paranormal occurrences as part of a campaign on frauds and deceptions.
“Despite the irony, she finds comfort, viewing this as a chance to clarify the facts openly and conclusively stop all rumors, confusion, and disputes,” stated Cardia’s lawyer, Solange Marchingoli.
Background and Related Incidents
Cardia, who has a previous conviction for financial crime, purchased the figure in 2016 at a Catholic pilgrimage site in Međugorje.
News of the trial came as the Vatican’s doctrinal office declared that supposed visions of Jesus in the French town of Dozulé in the 1970s were not of supernatural origin. Jesus was said to have shown himself to Madeleine Aumont 49 times asking that a “glorious cross” that would ensure the cleansing of sin be built in the town. The office announced that the alleged visions were “finally judged to be non-miraculous”.
Pope Leo authorized a decree last week instructing Catholics not to refer to Mary as the “co-redeemer”, that is to say that she assisted her son Jesus save the world from sin. His action was aimed to combat the proliferation of an extreme veneration of the Madonna, often on online platforms, that has encouraged claims of apparitions, weeping statues, and self-styled prophets.
The late Pope Francis cautioned in 2023 that appearances of Mary “do not always occur”.
