http://wdtprs.com/blog/2011/06/quaeritur-is-it-sinful-to-go-to-saturday-evening-mass-if-you-can-go-on-sunday/

All you FSSP priests be warned, too close association with the Novus Ordo will ruin your ability to make even the most basic distinctions, while words lose all meaning and the loss of the essence of things causes grave intellectual blindness.    

Okay Fr. Z, I realize this is high level philosophy, so brace yourself: Saturday is not Sunday when time is calculated from midnight.  To claim a Saturday evening Mass is a vigil is absurd on its face and attending Mass on Saturdy certainly doesn't relieve one of the obligation to attend Mass on Sunday.  This amounts to a de facto transfer of the Holy Day to Saturday which is not altogether surprising considering the amount of Judaizers in the Church, though this motive is not explicitly stated.  It is rather a little twist of irony and highly symbolic.  

Or even fallibility.   :wink:

The indult community already do these "anticipated" Masses on occasion.  Every year for the past five or six (I think) Holy Rosary parish in Indianapolis--where the "approved" extraordinary form is celebrated--has a Christmas Mass in the early evening of Christmas Eve.  The FSSP priest who started it claimed that what is listed as the "Midnight Mass" is really, in the Latin text, "Mass at Night", and can therefore be celebrated anytime after the sun has set.

Furthermore, this parish also celebrates the anticipated Mass on Saturday night in the "extraordinary form" the day before the Indianapolis 500 each May so that parishioners who are "attached to an older form" of the liturgy can go to Mass Saturday night and still get to the Racetrack early.  After all, the traffic can be murder.  For evidence, please check out the Holy Rosary bulletin for the Sunday prior to the race THIS YEAR:

http://www.holyrosaryindy.org/files/bulletin/2011/Bulletin%20110522.pdf

I'm still wondering how long it will be before this becomes a weekly event.

I've often wondered how it is the "day" can start at 4:00 pm (the earliest anticipation Mass I know of) but not end until 8:00 pm the following day.  Conciliar parishes routinely celebrate Sunday Mass as early as Saturday afternoon at 4:00 pm, a few Sunday morning Masses, and even a Sunday evening Mass at 6:00 pm or 7:00 pm.  If the Saturday 4:00 pm Mass counts as a Sunday Mass, then why, I've always wondered, is a Sunday night Mass at 7:00 pm Mass not counted as the Monday Mass?  I've never understood how a Holy Day of Obligation can be fulfilled by attending Mass anytime from mid-afternoon the day before until midnight the day of the Holy Day.  But then I learned that the New Code of Canon Law pretty much says that a day begins and ends whenever you want it to begin and end.  Thus, one day could be just 15 hours long while another day could be 30 hours long.

For my musing, I'm usually told that I'm just being like the Pharisees.

If you read the article on "Vigils" in the Catholic Encyclopedia, it becomes immediately evident that the notion that there can be a "vigil" for every Sunday of the year is absurd.

I'm curious, TKGS, what canon law is cited to support the assertion that the calculation of time is essentially arbitrary?

Firstly, the Novus Ordo does not say that the "Sunday" Mass on Saturday is a "vigil Mass".  They say it is an "anticipated Mass".  Vigils are completely separate Masses and the attendance of a Vigil Mass does not count for attendance at a Mass the following day.  For example, if you attend a Vigil Mass of a Holy Day, you must still attend Mass on the Holy Day.  If, in the Novus Ordo, you attend the anticipated Mass the afternoon or evening before a Holy Day (including Sundays) they pretend that you are relieved of any requirement to attend Mass on the Holy Day itself.  Note that even under the 1962 Mass, the earliest Christmas Mass is at midnight (thus on Christmas Day) and the Easter Vigil service is NOT a Mass; it is a service held in the late evening scheduled so that the actual Mass will begin as close to midnight as possible, thus fulfilling the Easter Mass.  Other vigil Masses are celebrated in the morning on the day before the Holy Day.  Of course, these requirements are being ignored in some indult parishes.

Secondly, Canon 32 § 1 of the Code of Canon Law (1917) states:  "A day consists of 24 consecutive hours; calculated from midnight".

Canon 202 § 1 of the 1983 codes states:  "In law, a day is understood as a period consisting of 24 continuous hours and begins at midnight unless other provision is expressly made" [Emphasis added].  Thus, in the Novus Ordo, Sunday is often held to begin as early as 4:00 pm Saturday afternoon while Monday is usually not held to begin until midnight.  Thus, one may completely fulfill his duty to keep holy the Lord's Day by attending Mass on Saturday, leaving Sunday free for football or, as I noted in a previous post, to attend the Indianapolis 500 race.  Other provisions, you see, have been made.  It is, as I noted, essentially an arbitrary decision made at the diocesan or, sometimes, parsih level.

"Keep holy the Lord's Day" is a commandment. Separate from that is the Church's law that one must assist at Mass on Sunday. The Church can alter this law as She sees fit. Thus allowing the Sunday Mass to be said on Saturday evening, out of generosity to the faithful, is completely within Her purview is it not?

Can. 1248 §1. A person who assists at a Mass celebrated anywhere in a Catholic rite either on the feast day itself or in the evening of the preceding day satisfies the obligation of participating in the Mass.

The particulars of the Sunday Mass obligation are disciplinary rules of the Church that can be modified.

Doesn't the Society recognize the legality of the post conciliar disciplinary laws, such as the reduction of the Eucharistic fast, etc. even if it recommends that its followers keep the old disciplinary practice?

To have the opinion that the better rule would be to limit Sunday Masses to the 24 hour calendar day is one thing. To say that assisting at a Sat. evening Mass doesn't count for Sunday and is sinful, when the Church says otherwise, is quite another.

Is Sunday considered a feast day or are you merely extrapolating the law?  According to the calculation of time, both canonically and liturgically, the day begins at midnight.  Attending Mass on Saturday is a de facto transfer of the Holy Day, yet there is no provision in law stating that this has occurred.