A self-styled mystic who drew many of pilgrims to a community near Rome by asserting that a statue of the Virgin Mary shed bloody tears has been ordered to stand trial for alleged deception.
Central Accusations and Details
The accused woman, who also claimed the figure was transmitting messages to her, will be prosecuted together with her husband, Gianni Cardia, in the spring next year.
They are accused of orchestrating false visions of the Virgin Mary and issuing untrue predictions of catastrophes to solicit contributions from their Catholic supporters.
Cardia brought hundreds of individuals monthly to a lakeside town, a scenic town near Rome, to worship before the figure, which had been positioned in a temporary shrine on a hill. Over a number of years, the alleged scam collected €365,000 in donations from the pilgrims, who believed their money would go towards establishing a facility for sick children.
Additional Allegations
Cardia is also charged with issuing false predictions, including stating the figure warned her that the devil was planning calamities, for example an earthquake that would destroy Rome and the seizure of the Catholic church by communism.
Prosecutors in the port city of Civitavecchia opened an inquiry in 2023 after a detective asserted the substance on the figure came from a pig. Cardia was later declared a fraud by the Catholic church, which afterward tightened its rules on paranormal phenomena as part of a crackdown on frauds and deceptions.
“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 her legal representative, Solange Marchingoli.
Background and Related Incidents
The accused, who has a previous sentence for bankruptcy fraud, bought the statue in 2016 at a religious pilgrimage site in Međugorje.
News 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 not of supernatural origin. Jesus was alleged to have shown himself to a woman 49 times asking that a “magnificent crucifix” that would guarantee the cleansing of sin be constructed in the town. The office announced that the claimed visions were “considered, definitively, as not supernatural in origin”.
The pontiff authorized a decree last week instructing Catholics not to call Mary as the “joint savior”, that is to say that she assisted her son Jesus save the world from sin. His action was intended to counter the spread of an extreme worship of the Madonna, often on online platforms, that has emboldened claims of apparitions, weeping statues, and so-called prophets.
The former Pope Francis cautioned in 2023 that apparitions of Mary “do not always occur”.
