Virgin Mary statue row | Pope Francis says Virgin Mary apparitions not always real: Report

Pope Francis said on Sunday (June 4) that apparitions of the Virgin Mary are not real, in what appeared to be an indirect reference to a woman who drew thousands of pilgrims to a town near Rome to pray before a statue that she claimed shed tears of blood. According to a report by The Guardian, Pope Francis said “There are images of the Madonna that are real, but the Madonna has never drawn [attention] to herself.”

“I like to see her with her finger pointing up to Jesus. When Marian devotion is too self-centred, it’s not good. Both in the devotion and in the people who carry it forward,” Francis added.

Francis' interview was aired a few days after residents in Rome's Trevignano town called on the pontiff to intervene against Maria Giuseppe Scarpulla.

Who is Maria Giuseppe Scarpulla?

For the last five years, Maria Giuseppe Scarpulla has organised monthly ceremonies in a park overlooking Lake Bracciano where a statue of the Virgin Mary sits in a glass case. Nicknamed "the saint" and “clairvoyant”, Scarpulla bought the statue at a Catholic pilgrimage site in Bosnia.

Upon returning to Italy, she claimed the Madonna made apparitions, wept tears of blood and was communicating messages to her. The woman is currently facing a judicial investigation after a private investigator alleged that the blood stains on the statue came from a pig, and some of her followers said they were scammed, The Guardian report said.

Last week, local bishop Marco Salvi urged pilgrims to stop flocking to the site on the third of each month as they have prayed before the statue in search of cures for serious illnesses.

Scarpulla was convicted in the past

Maria Giuseppe Scarpulla has been convicted of bankruptcy fraud. She had created a foundation through which she collected donations, which she reportedly said would go towards setting up a centre for sick children. In April this year, Scarpulla and her husband fled Trevignano after the investigation was opened. Scarpulla said she was undeterred by the probe as well as an order for the glass case to be demolished, the report said.

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