Archdiocese: St. Michael statue is not bleeding, might be nail polish

Although Catholics are certainly no stranger to miracles, Church officials say one woman’s claim of a bleeding St. Michael statue prior to the Russian invasion of Ukraine is not a miracle. In fact, the church says the red dried liquid on the statue appears to be red nail polish.

A Colorado grocery store employee claimed on February 23 her statue of St. Michael started bleeding on the head, with blood running down his face and around his eyes, just shortly before the world learned of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. However, after an investigation, Denver archdiocese officials say the statue is not bleeding and the red running down from the head is not blood.

The archdiocese took swabs of the alleged blood from the statue and had a chemical analysis performed on it to determine if it was blood. Archdiocese officials told Catholic News Agency their investigation did not find any evidence to suggest it was blood. In fact, according to the CNA, investigators determined the red liquid could be red nail polish.

“The archdiocese said that ‘a chemical analysis was conducted of the dried liquid on the cotton swabs using the Kastle-Meyer method for presumptive positive blood samples. The test definitively showed that the red liquid obtained from the statue was neither human nor animal blood. The appearance of the substance on the cotton swabs was similar to red nail polish,” according to Catholic News Agency.

The woman, Alicia Martinez, is a native of Mexico and made the claim on social media and YouTube of the bleeding statue. When her video was originally posted, many accused her of seeking attention and perhaps financial gain. She denied there were any alternative motives and removed the video after suffering some of the allegations from social media users. However, the archdiocese has determined her claim of a miracle is unfounded and fake.

Many miracles have been reported in connection to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, including Ukrainians seeing angels in the clouds over Kyiv, Ukraine. It appears, however, this alleged miracle is nothing but a forgery. The process, and allegation, shows the importance of the church’s investigative process into allegations of miracles.

A few of the most recent miracles recognized by the Catholic Church was the curing of an Indian woman with an abdominal tumor which was credited to the intercession of Mother Teresa, paving the way for her beatification in 2003. Additionally, a miracle was recognized by a bishop in 2018 when Beauvais Bishop Jacques Benoit-Gonin proclaimed the healing of a long-debilitation nun following a pilgrimage to Lourdes. One of the most recent miracles recognized by the church paved the path for Knights of Columbus founder Fr. Michael McGivney to be named a Blessed after an unborn child of a Tennessee couple was miraculously healed from fetal hydrops. The miracle places Fr. McGivney one step closer to being canonized.