A so-called visionary who drew many 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.
Central Charges and Particulars
The accused woman, who also stated the statue was transmitting messages to her, will be tried along with her husband, Gianni Cardia, in the spring next year.
They are charged with staging false visions of the Virgin Mary and making false predictions of catastrophes to attract contributions from their Catholic supporters.
Cardia drew hundreds of people monthly to Trevignano Romano, a lakeside town near Rome, to pray before the statue, which had been positioned in a makeshift shrine on a hill. Over a number of years, the supposed scam generated €365,000 in donations from the pilgrims, who trusted their funds would go towards establishing a centre for ill children.
Additional Claims
Cardia is also accused of making untrue prophecies, including claiming the figure alerted her that the evil was concocting disasters, for example an tremor that would devastate Rome and the seizure of the Catholic church by political ideology.
Prosecutors in the port city of Civitavecchia opened an inquiry in 2023 after a private investigator claimed the substance on the statue originated from a animal. Cardia was later declared a deceiver by the Catholic church, which subsequently strengthened its regulations on paranormal phenomena as part of a crackdown 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,” said her legal representative, Solange Marchingoli.
Background and Related Events
The accused, who has a prior sentence for bankruptcy fraud, purchased the figure in 2016 at a religious holy place in Međugorje.
Reports of the case came as the Vatican’s doctrinal office stated that supposed apparitions 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 constructed in the town. The office said that the claimed visions were “finally judged to be non-miraculous”.
Pope Leo approved 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 redeem the world from sin. His intervention was aimed to counter the spread of an exaggerated veneration of the Madonna, often on social media, that has emboldened claims of visions, crying figures, and self-styled seers.
The late pope cautioned in 2023 that apparitions of Mary “do not always occur”.
