DISCLAIMER Any resemblance of these fictional characters to any real persons is NOT intended. This is purely a hypothetical for the sake of discussion.


My answer is: Yes.

Let's take an extreme example. Imagine you have a priest who is running a de-facto cult, with a firm control over the operations of most families attending, he demands to turn over most money to the "group", and the leader and/or several officials in the group are involved with pedophilia. Let's say they use various brainwashing techniques as well. But let's also say the priest(s) in the group are validly ordained, and you have no other Mass within 200 miles. What do you do? Long story short, there are valid reasons to stay home from Mass on Sunday. Some people just don't have options for a Tridentine Mass in their area, or a decent Tridentine Mass. It happens. When you stay home for the RIGHT reasons, God WILL take care of you.

When your "valid Mass" comes with a certain threshold of risk, of baggage, of evil -- it's time to re-evaluate whether you should attend.

The graces from a valid Mass aren't going to MAGICALLY restore virginity and innocence to your children, restore money to your bank accounts, undo psychological damage, restore jobs that you gave up to move across the country, restore your trust in priests, or reverse long-term damage done to your Faith, and that of your family and children. It also won't bring back vocations that were lost due to the circuмstances (individual evils) surrounding the chapel.

I agree.  

Our family falls into this category...our SSPX chapel had a liberal priest, now working at the seminary.  When my husband talked to him in 2012 about events occurring in the SSPX, his jaw dropped at some of the things he heard.  There is now another, more "orthodox" priest there now, but since we have small children my husband made the decision that in terms of stability it would be better to not start reattending.  Are you going to stop every time there's a priest who's doctrine is questionable?  What kind of message would that send?  "Oh, Dad and mom don't like this priest.  We don't have to go.  Now they like this one, and we can go to Mass."  So basically, if you like the priest, go to Mass.  If you don't, stay home.  

There's also the question of how the other families attending the chapel may raise their children.  Several of them we knew sent their children to the N.O. school, one even to a non-denominational Christian school--all on the advice of a prior pastor.  Then there's the many adults who attended the indult Mass during the weekdays, just so they could go to Mass.  

Luckily for us, we live in an area where there are many beautiful older churches NOT touched by the Vatican II overhaul, and so we are able to sanctify the Sunday as much as we're able under the circuмstances.  

Those people who don't have small children to raise in these times are spared a very heavy cross!    

and the leader and/or several officials in the group are involved with pedophilia. Let's say they use various brainwashing techniques as well. But let's also say the priest(s) in the group are validly ordained, and you have no other Mass within 200 miles. What do you do?

What you have described could essentially be the description of your typical non-FSSP Indult Mass.

Not the cult-leader priest part (you usually have a few rotating priests saying Mass) but the part about the overall group (the N.O.) being involved in pedophilia, etc.

However, I do not think one should "stay home" instead of go to an Indult Mass if it's the only Mass available for 200 miles. I've got kids to raise who need the Sacraments (as well as myself) and so when we lived in places in the situation where the Indult was the only thing around for 200 miles, we went.

I hated the mealy-mouthed milquetoast sermons from some of the priests, I hated getting to Mass a little to early and witnessing them pushing the "table" on wheels out of the way in the sanctuary, but I was able to get the Sacraments.

It's a hard situation to be in, and everyone in it has a cross to bear in deciding how to handle the problem.

Plus the question of whether the indult priest was ordained in Montini's bastardized rite of 1968 and thus doubtfully even a priest at all.

The Archbishop would say not to go to indult or ecclesia Dei masses. So was he wrong? I don't think so. He knew it wasn't just about the validity of the mass.