A self-styled visionary who attracted many of pilgrims to a town near Rome by claiming that a figure of the Virgin Mary shed bloody tears has been ordered to stand trial for alleged fraud.
Key Charges and Particulars
The accused woman, who also claimed the statue was transmitting messages to her, will be prosecuted along with her spouse, Gianni Cardia, in the spring the coming year.
They are accused of staging fake visions of the Virgin Mary and issuing false predictions of catastrophes to solicit donations from their Catholic supporters.
Cardia drew many of individuals monthly to Trevignano Romano, 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 supposed scheme generated a large sum in donations from the pilgrims, who trusted their money would go towards establishing a facility for sick children.
Further Allegations
Cardia is also accused of making untrue prophecies, including stating the figure warned 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 asserted the blood on the figure originated from a pig. Cardia was later labeled a fraud by the Catholic church, which subsequently tightened its regulations on paranormal phenomena 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,” stated her legal representative, the attorney.
Background and Connected Events
Cardia, who has a previous conviction for bankruptcy fraud, bought the figure in 2016 at a religious pilgrimage site in Međugorje.
Reports of the trial came as the Vatican’s doctrinal office declared that supposed apparitions of Jesus in the European town of Dozulé in the 1970s were deemed non-miraculous. Jesus was alleged to have shown himself to a woman 49 times requesting that a “magnificent crucifix” that would guarantee the purification of sin be constructed in the town. The authority said that the alleged apparitions were “finally judged to be non-miraculous”.
Pope Leo approved a ruling last week instructing Catholics not to refer to Mary as the “co-redeemer”, that is to say that she helped her son Jesus redeem the world from damnation. His intervention was aimed to counter the spread of an exaggerated veneration of the Madonna, often on social media, that has emboldened assertions of visions, crying statues, and self-styled prophets.
The former pope cautioned in 2023 that apparitions of Mary “do not always occur”.
