most Traditional Catholics have been taught according to the SSPX model which concentrates upon validity, and sacrifices the moral and legal issues which has for generations allowed people to be ignorant of the import of their implications.
Agree totally. When you read Card Ottaviani's analysis, he repeatedly stresses the novelties of the new theology and its detriment to the Faith. The anti-catholic, freemasonic theology, which spills over into the atmosphere of the new liturgy (by design) is what makes the novus ordo IMMORAL, which Fr Wathen so eloquently detailed.
Card Ottaviani spends a small % of his report on the validity aspect, because the false theology is much more damning. And he didn't mention the legality at all, because at the time when he was studying it, the novus ordo hadn't been implemented, so it wasn't yet illegal. Now that we know that Quo Primum wasn't revised or revoked, we know the novus ordo is illegal and gravely sinful - an additional damning aspect.
I can understand why the sspx (and others) didn't want to argue on the legality issue, since until Benedict's motu of 2007, it was still debatable. But now, we know for sure. What I can't understand is why the immorality of the new mass was never agreed upon by most Trads. Many would say "Don't go to it" but they would never call it a sin outright.
In my opinion, it's because 1) many believed that a valid novus ordo was somehow a "good thing" and would outweigh any "circuмstantial" sacrilegeous aspects. In other words, a bad theological argument of "it's better to say a blasphemous prayer to God than no prayer at all." By this false logic, it would be better to go to protestant worship on sundays rather than miss mass if there is none available. "A bad prayer is better than none." Not a catholic notion.
2) Most priests would not call the new mass a sin outright because (deep down) they don't believe in the Conspiracy and the true revolution which happened at V2, therefore they can't accept that the Church was fully infiltrated, to its core, and that freemasons had invented a new mass, with the SOLE purpose of destroying catholicism.
Of course it's human nature to have trouble coming to terms with such events, and to have trouble realizing that God would allow such horrors be committed to His Church, especially when so many of our family members, friends and coworkers are "nice" and they go along with the changes and see nothing wrong with it. But the facts show, ESPECIALLY AFTER 50 YEARS, that V2/novus ordo were not accidents, not isolated errors, but systematic destruction which was implemented with precision, scheduling and very much premeditated.