A so-called visionary who drew hundreds of pilgrims to a community near Rome by claiming that a figure of the Virgin Mary shed tears of blood has been sent to trial for alleged fraud.
Key Accusations and Particulars
The accused woman, who also stated the statue was transmitting messages to her, will be prosecuted along with her spouse, Gianni Cardia, in April the coming year.
They are accused of orchestrating fake apparitions of the Virgin Mary and making untrue forecasts of catastrophes to solicit contributions from their Catholic supporters.
Cardia brought hundreds of individuals monthly to a lakeside town, a lakeside town near Rome, to pray before the statue, which had been placed in a makeshift sanctuary on a hill. Over several years, the supposed scheme collected a large sum in offerings from the visitors, who believed their funds would go towards establishing a facility for ill children.
Additional Claims
Cardia is also accused of issuing false predictions, including claiming the statue alerted her that the evil was concocting calamities, for example an tremor that would destroy Rome and the takeover of the Catholic church by communism.
Legal authorities in the coastal city of Civitavecchia initiated an inquiry in 2023 after a private investigator asserted the blood on the figure came from a pig. Cardia was later declared a deceiver by the Catholic church, which afterward strengthened its rules on paranormal occurrences as part of a campaign on frauds and hoaxes.
“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,” stated Cardia’s lawyer, Solange Marchingoli.
Context and Related Incidents
Cardia, who has a previous sentence for bankruptcy fraud, purchased the statue in 2016 at a Catholic pilgrimage site in Međugorje.
News of the trial came as the Vatican’s religious authority declared that supposed apparitions of Jesus in the French town of Dozulé in the 1970s were not of supernatural origin. Jesus was said to have appeared to a woman 49 times asking that a “glorious cross” 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”.
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 combat the spread of an extreme worship of the Madonna, often on online platforms, that has emboldened assertions of visions, crying figures, and so-called prophets.
The former pope cautioned in 2023 that apparitions of Mary “are not always real”.
