A so-called mystic who attracted many of pilgrims to a community near Rome by claiming that a figure of the Virgin Mary wept bloody tears has been sent to trial for suspected deception.
Central Accusations and Particulars
Gisella Cardia, who also stated the statue was transmitting messages to her, will be tried along with her husband, Gianni Cardia, in April next year.
They are accused of orchestrating false apparitions of the Virgin Mary and issuing false predictions of catastrophes to solicit contributions from their religious followers.
Cardia drew hundreds of individuals monthly to a lakeside town, a scenic town near Rome, to worship before the statue, which had been positioned in a makeshift sanctuary on a hill. Over several years, the alleged scheme generated a large sum in donations from the visitors, who believed their money would go towards setting up a facility for ill children.
Further Allegations
Cardia is also charged with issuing untrue predictions, including claiming the figure warned her that the evil was concocting calamities, for example an tremor that would destroy Rome and the takeover of the Catholic church by political ideology.
Prosecutors in the port city of Civitavecchia initiated an investigation in 2023 after a private investigator claimed the blood on the figure came from a pig. Cardia was later declared a deceiver by the Catholic church, which afterward tightened its regulations on paranormal phenomena as part of a crackdown on frauds 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,” stated her legal representative, Solange Marchingoli.
Context and Related Events
Cardia, who has a prior conviction for bankruptcy fraud, bought the statue in 2016 at a religious holy place in Međugorje.
Reports of the case came as the Vatican’s doctrinal office stated that supposed visions of Jesus in the French town of Dozulé in the 1970s were deemed non-miraculous. Jesus was said to have shown himself to Madeleine Aumont 49 times asking that a “magnificent crucifix” that would ensure the cleansing of sin be built in the town. The authority announced that the claimed apparitions were “finally judged to be non-miraculous”.
Pope Leo authorized a ruling last week instructing Catholics not to refer to Mary as the “joint savior”, that is to say that she helped her son Jesus redeem the world from damnation. His intervention was aimed to counter the proliferation of an exaggerated worship of the Madonna, often on social media, that has encouraged claims of visions, crying statues, and self-styled seers.
The late pope cautioned in 2023 that apparitions of Mary “are not always real”.
