A so-called mystic who drew many of devotees to a community near Rome by asserting that a statue of the Virgin Mary wept bloody tears has been ordered to stand trial for alleged deception.
Central Charges and Particulars
The accused woman, who also stated the statue was transmitting communications to her, will be tried along with her husband, Gianni Cardia, in April next year.
They are charged with staging false apparitions of the Virgin Mary and issuing untrue forecasts of disasters to attract contributions from their Catholic followers.
Cardia drew many of individuals monthly to a lakeside town, a lakeside town near Rome, to worship before the statue, which had been placed in a makeshift shrine on a elevation. Over a number of years, the supposed scheme collected €365,000 in offerings from the visitors, who believed their money would go towards setting up a facility for ill children.
Further Allegations
Cardia is also accused of issuing false predictions, including stating the figure alerted her that the devil was planning calamities, for example an earthquake that would devastate Rome and the seizure of the Catholic church by communism.
Legal authorities in the port city of Civitavecchia opened an investigation in 2023 after a detective claimed the substance on the figure originated from a animal. Cardia was later declared a deceiver by the Catholic church, which afterward tightened its regulations on paranormal occurrences as part of a campaign on scams 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 her legal representative, the attorney.
Background and Connected Incidents
Cardia, who has a prior conviction for financial crime, purchased the statue in 2016 at a religious holy place in Međugorje.
Reports of the case came as the Vatican’s religious authority stated that alleged visions of Jesus in the French town of Dozulé in the 1970s were not of supernatural origin. Jesus was alleged to have shown himself to Madeleine Aumont 49 times asking that a “glorious cross” that would guarantee the cleansing of sin be constructed in the town. The office said that the alleged apparitions were “finally judged to be non-miraculous”.
The pontiff authorized a decree last week directing Catholics not to call Mary as the “joint savior”, that is to say that she helped her son Jesus save the world from damnation. His action was intended to counter the spread of an exaggerated worship of the Madonna, often on social media, that has encouraged claims of apparitions, weeping figures, and self-styled seers.
The late Pope Francis cautioned in 2023 that apparitions of Mary “do not always occur”.
