sacrificed - i.e. they offered an oblation, which can and ought
justly to be understood not of an oblation made to idols, but of
the mass, since it is called by the Greeks liturgy. And that in
the primitive Church the mass was a sacrifice the holy fathers
copiously testify, and they support this opinion. For Ignatius, a
pupil of St. John the Apostle, says: "It is not allowable without
a bishop either to offer a sacrifice or to celebrate masses." And
Irenaeus, a pupil of John, clearly testifies that "Christ taught
the new oblation of the New Testament, which the Church, receiving
from the apostles, offers to God throughout the entire world."
This bishop, borderin upon the times of the apostles, testifies
that the new evangelical sacrifice was offered throughout the
entire world. Origin, Cyprian, Jerome, Chrysostom, Augustine,
Basil, Hilary, etc., teach and testify the same, whose words for
brevity's sake are omitted. Since, therefore, the Catholic Church
throughout the entire Christian world has always taught, held and
observed as it today holds and observes, the same ought today to
be held and observed inviolably. Nor does St. Paul in Hebrews
oppose the oblation of the mass when he says that by one offering
we have once been justified through Christ. For St. Paul is
speaking of the offering of a victim - i.e. of a bloody sacrifice,
of a lamb slain, viz. upon the cross - which offering was indeed
once made whereby all sacraments, and even the sacrifice of the
mass, have their efficacy. Therefore he was offered but once with
the shedding of blood - viz. upon the cross; today he is offered
in the mass as a peace making and sacramental victim. Then he was
offered in a visible form capable of suffering; today he is
offered in the mass veiled in mysteries, incapable of suffering,
just as in the Old Testament he was sacrificed typically and
under a figure. Finally, the force of the word shows that the mass