[Question:]{.underline} How can one claim that the New Mass is evil, and yet at the same time maintain that it is not always and necessarily all bad, heretical, invalid, heterodox, and non-Catholic?
[Answer:]{.underline} At first glance it is certainly true that the above two statements would seem to be contradictory, namely that if the New Mass is truly evil, then it must necessarily be all bad, heretical, invalid, heterodox, and non-Catholic. Traditional priests are certainly framed to hold to this rigid, inflexible, and extreme caricature by those who were once traditional but who have since returned to the modernist church. They claim that we cannot say that the New Mass is evil, since it was promulgated by the pope, and that it consequently cannot possibly be all bad, heretical, invalid, heterodox, and non-Catholic.
However, as is usually the case in such discussions, the truth can only be arrived at by making much more careful distinctions. It also depends upon the understanding of analogical concepts, which are essential to theology. An analogy is a comparison between two things that are similar, and which truly do share a same reality, but in which, nevertheless, the dissimilitude is greater than the likeness. It is by analogy, for example, that the concepts of matter and form, induced from living beings, are applied to the sacraments.
The concept of evil is such an analogical notion. There is a something common in all things that are evil, but there is a world of difference between different kinds of evils, such as between physical or moral evil. There is something in common, but the dissimilitude is greater than the likeness. The same can be said of the comparison between a black (Satanic) Mass and the New Mass. Both are sacrilegious and both are evil, but in entirely different ways.
The definition of evil given by the moral theologians is very simple: evil is the privation of the good that is due. It is not just an absence, but the absence of a good that ought to be there. Sickness is a physical evil, since the body ought to be healthy. Sin is a moral evil, since the soul ought to be pure and pleasing to God.
When the term “evil” is applied to the New Mass, it refers to the Mass as a liturgical act, namely as an assemblage of ceremonies and prayers molded into one whole. As such, it has as its goal to accomplish the reality of the Mass as defined by Catholic doctrine, namely the unbloody reactualization of Christ’s sacrifice on the Cross for the four purposes of adoration, thanksgiving, expiation, and petition, for the greater glory of the Most Holy Trinity. Furthermore, the ceremonies of the Mass are of their very nature symbolic. They are symbols of the underlying reality they represent, and are the most solemn, public, complete profession of our Catholic Faith.
Consequently, it is essential to the Mass as a liturgical act that it be essentially a sacrifice, and the very same sacrifice as Christ’s on the Cross; that it explicitly express and accomplish the four ends of this sacrifice; and that it express publicly and with solemnity the complete, integral Catholic Faith, especially with respect to the opposing protestant and modernist errors: namely that the Mass is but a meal, a sharing, a communion, an act of the assembly, without the need for true expiation for sins, without the acknowledgment of the transcendence of God by adoration, professing our nothingness and wretchedness.
A Mass, consequently, that is lacking in any of these elements, manifestly suffers from a privation of the good that is due to it. It is not what the Mass ought to be, and cannot attain the purpose of the Mass. It is quite simply evil, and that privation of the due good is in the assembly of ceremonies and prayers of the Mass itself. It is not at all a judgment on the intention of the priest or of the assistants, nor does it mean that graces cannot be received by both. The affirmation that the New Mass is evil is an objective statement that this liturgical act as such does not adequately profess the Faith, nor does it attain its end, or as Cardinals Ottaviani and Bacci put it: “The Novus Ordo Missae … represents, both as a whole and in its details, a striking departure from the Catholic theology of the Mass as it was formulated in Session 22 of the Council of Trent. The ‘canons’ of the rite definitely fixed at that time erected an insurmountable barrier against any heresy which might attack the integrity of the Mystery” (Ottaviani Intervention, September 25, 1969).
However, the fact of the privation that exists in the New Mass does not mean that it is all bad. Some elements of the traditional Mass have been retained. Some expressions that remain are Catholic. For example, if 760 of the 1182 prayers in the traditional Missal have been eliminated from the New, this means that 422 have been retained. (Cf. Cekada, The Problems with the Prayers of the Modern Mass, p. 9.) Although it is true that over half of these 422 have been modified to avoid “negative” or “unecumenical” theology, such as hell, judgment, punishment for sin, detachment from the world, Christ’s social kingship, the Church militant, the triumph of the Catholic Faith, the souls of the faithful departed, the merits of the saints, the conversion of non-Catholics, nevertheless 17 % of the prayers did make it untouched into the new Missal. This is a horrifying indictment of the New Mass, and shows the gravity of the privation, but it also means that it is not all bad. Thanksgiving and petition have been retained, expiation has been entirely eliminated, and adoration watered down. The reality of the Mass as a true sacrifice has been obscured, in particular by the omission of the traditional Offertory prayers, and substitution with purely naturalistic formulae. Nevertheless, the prayers of the Canon have been mostly retained in Eucharistic Prayer No. 1, which is hardly ever used.
Likewise, the fact that the New Mass was framed in such a way as to be acceptable to the Protestant theologians who participated in it does not mean that it is necessarily heretical. The absence of a clear profession of the Catholic Faith (which is due) makes it evil. However, in its ambiguity it can be used by those who have the Catholic Faith, as it can be used by those who deny that it is a true sacrifice. It is certainly used to favor heresy, but this does not mean that it explicitly professes heresy.
Likewise for the validity. The fact that it is evil does not mean that
it is necessarily invalid. A priest can have the intention of doing what
the Church does and still celebrate validly, even if the prayers of the
New Mass do not adequately express that intention. The changes in the
words of consecration of the Body and Blood of Our Lord as approved by
Rome do not necessarily invalidate the Mass at all. Remember that the
words “for all” are only an introduction as a false translation, but
that the original Latin text has
”for many,” as does the traditional Mass. Even this change does not
necessarily invalidate the New Mass, for there is a true sense in which
Christ died for all men, namely with respect to the sufficiency of his
sacrifice. It is certainly a sacrilege and a mortal sin for a priest to
use the words “for all” or “for all men” in the consecration of the
precious Blood, but it does not necessarily invalidate it. If nobody has
the right to change the words of Christ, or confect or administer a
doubtful sacrament, and this is certainly a sacrilege, it does not
necessarily follow that it is invalid. This being said, there are
certainly many New Masses that are invalid, either because the principle
of change and evolution has undermined the divine institution of the
sacrament, or because the intention of renewing Christ’s sacrifice on
Calvary in an unbloody way has been refused (as is entirely compatible
with the New Mass).
Likewise for the question of whether the New Mass is heterodox and non-Catholic. In one sense it is, inasmuch as the privations mentioned above make it compatible with non-Catholic teachings, so it can be used without any qualm of conscience by non-Catholics---that is, by heretics. However, in another sense it is not. It is approved by the official hierarchy of the Church that still professes to be Catholic, and to hold to the entirety of Catholic doctrine (although we know that it does not do so). It does not openly and explicitly express the direct contradictory of any defined dogma. Consequently, there are many good Catholics, who still believe in the integrity of the deposit of the Faith, who celebrate and assist at the New Mass, and who do so in good faith, receiving graces from it, not understanding the evil of the New Mass nor the gravity of the crisis in the Church. For inasmuch as the New Mass is valid, it truly is an unbloody renewal of Calvary, and gives graces to those who are correctly disposed, and continues to nourish the life of the Church. This being said, it remains entirely illicit for one who understands the evil of the New Mass to celebrate it or to assist at it.
Answered by Father Peter Scott, SSPX.