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Bishop Williamson wrongly says that the Council of Trent infallibly teaches that a valid new mass gives Grace. Here are Bishop Williamson’s recent words:

I’m sure you ask yourselves: “What kind of world are my children going to have to grow up in? How are they going to keep the Faith?” Very good question. By prayer and Charity and by frequenting the sacraments, so long as they are still available, so long as it’s at all still possible to reach the sacraments. And some Novus—I’ve got into quite a lot of controversy for saying this, but it’s true—there is no question that some Novus Ordo Masses are valid.1 And if they’re valid, then it’s defined by the Council of Trent that grace passes, “ex opere operato”, is the strict phrase.2

We have already shown that the new mass never gives grace and how Bishop Williamson falsifies the teaching of the Council of Trent. Archbishop Lefebvre, also states the new mass does not give grace. Here are his words:

[T]he Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, desecrated as it is [i.e., the new mass], no longer confers grace and no longer transmits it.

Open Letter to Confused Catholics, Ch.3.

Bishop Williamson was a great bishop and could be so again, in the future. Let us pray for this poor man who is spending his days promoting his own brand of liberalism which is not the teaching of the Church or Archbishop Lefebvre.

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  1. Bishop Williamson here assumes that some new masses are valid. This would automatically mean that the new mass has a valid Offertory, Consecration, and Consumption of the Victim (Communion). For purposes of this article, we leave aside—but do not grant—his unsupported assumption.

    His assumption is rash because the conciliar “offertory” is so radically different that it falsifies the Traditional Offertory and might properly be called an “anti-Offertory”. This is like former Pope Benedict XVI’s description of Vatican II as an “anti-Syllabus”, because it is the opposite of Traditional teachings (and falsifies those teachings).

    Also, Bishop Williamson here implicitly makes the unsupported assumption that some conciliar ordinations and consecrations are known to be valid—which is a necessary assumption to support his supposition that some new masses are definitely valid. But the truth is that the validity of all conciliar “ordinations” and “consecrations” is inherently doubtful. For a thorough explanation of this, see these Catholic Candle analyses:

  2. May 20, 2016 conference (emphasis added).