Maria was inducted in the convent of Unterzell in the Prince-Bishopric of Würzburg in 1699, where she made herself known for her great piety and was appointed Sub Prioress in 1740.
The church then conducted an exorcism at the convent, during which the nuns rolled on the ground and "howled and snapped like mad cats."
Renata confessed to a Benedictine confessor that she was a satanist and a witch; that in 1687, at the age of seven, she had sworn herself to Satan; at twelve, had become a prostitute and learned magic and to mix poisons; in 1694, Maria was baptized at a black mass; and in 1699, had entered the nunnery entirely to make strife amongst the "brides of Christ."
She said she was remorseful, but the church still judged her guilty of sorcery, heresy, witchcraft, apostasy, and satanism, then turned her over to the secular authorities to be executed.
The academic debates it occasioned—argued among Abbot Tartarotti, Scipione Maffei, Count Carli and others—eventually prompted the end of witchcraft as a legal matter.