The Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith announced on Tuesday that the "visions", "revelations" and "messages" published by her can only be understood as literary forms of expression with which the author retold the life of Jesus in her own way.
According to the press release, the clarification was prompted by the fact that clergy and laity repeatedly asked the dicastery about the Church's assessment of the works, in particular the life of Jesus narrative "The God-Man".
"In its long tradition, the Church does not accept the apocryphal Gospels and other similar texts as authoritative, as it does not recognise their divine inspiration and refers to the secure tradition of the inspired Gospels," the dicastery emphasised.
In her writings, Valtorta refers to visions in which Jesus himself is said to have revealed himself to her. She claims to have received her visions between 1943 and 1953. She wrote around 15,000 pages in total.
Her main work "The God-Man", originally entitled "The Gospel as it was revealed to me", was compiled by her confessor on the basis of her handwritten notes.
In 1959, it was included in the "Index of Prohibited Books", which was later abolished. In 1960, the Vatican newspaper "Osservatore Romano" described the work as a "badly romanticised life of Jesus".
In 1985, the then Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, confirmed his authority's continued negative stance in a letter to the Archbishop of Genoa.
Regular judgements on alleged supernatural phenomena
Last May, the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith published new guidelines for the examination of alleged supernatural phenomena and revelations. The aim is no longer to definitively establish the supernatural nature of an event.
Instead, it classifies the examined events into different categories, ranging from a "Nihil obstat", in which the pastoral value of an event is recognised, to a "Prohibetur et obstruatur", in which the critical aspects predominate and the veneration of the phenomenon must not be upheld.
Valtorta's works are not explicitly categorised, but the clear rejection corresponds to a "declaratio de non supernaturalitate", the declaration that the phenomenon is not considered supernatural.
Since the publication of the new guidelines, the authority has published several new assessments of alleged miracles as well as decisions that have already been made, for example on the the alleged apparition of the "Lady of All Nations" in Amsterdamhas been recalled.
The most significant decision based on the new guidelines to date is the positive judgement on the Marian pilgrimage site Medjugorje where it was determined that nothing stood in the way of veneration.