The findings of a DNA test appear to disprove a woman’s allegations that a statue of the Virgin Mary “cried blood.”
In 2016, while visiting a place of worship in Medjugorje, Bosnia, Gisella Cardia bought a statue of the Catholic figure and brought it back to Trevignano Romano, Italy.
Cardia continued to make a number of serious allegations regarding the statue, such as that it “cried blood” and that it somehow communicated with her.
People went to see the effigy because of its alleged mystical abilities, and Cardia later received thousands of dollars.
However, in 2023, prosecutors in Civitavecchia accused Cardia of fraud after it was claimed that the blood on the monument was actually pig blood.
The results of the study, which included taking DNA swabs from the Virgin Mary sculpture, were just made public.
Additional information has surfaced after the initial set of results verified that the blood belonged to a human woman.
Laboratory examinations have revealed traces of Cardia’s DNA in the blood on the monument, according to the Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera.
But according to her attorney, whether the DNA is single-profile or mixed doesn’t necessarily suggest that the entire situation was a hoax.
In light of this, she has demanded more research.
Solange Marchignoli said: “From a scientific point of view, the DNA stain deserves further investigation.”
“We are waiting to know if it is a mixed or single profile: if the profile is single, it means that it is only Cardia’s and she put it there, so in this case we would go to trial, but if, as expected, the profile is mixed, it means that the DNA found on the statue also contains Gisella’s DNA, which we expect because she used the statuette, kissed it and handled it.”
Marchignoli continued by saying that Cardi is “not crazy” and that her client “is moved by a deep faith and has nothing to gain from this.”
Following an internal investigation by the Diocese of Civita Castellana, which concluded that the occurrences in issue were “non-supernatural,” the DNA findings were released.
In a statement issued in May 2024, the religious organization said on behalf of the bishop of Civita Castellana, Marco Salvi: “After an appropriate period of careful discernment, having listened to the testimonies coming from the [diocesan] territory and making use of a commission of experts, made up of a Mariologist, a theologian, a canonist, a psychologist, and with the outside advice of some specialists, having considered the figure of Mary in the Tradition of the Church and in the living faith of the people of God, after fervent prayer, decrees the events in question to be non-supernatural.”
