Let me be clear: I am not, and nor have I ever been, a member of the Society of St. Pius X, but I have to tell you, their French wing is doing something really wonderful that the rest of the Church should be paying attention to, and the irony of it is that they are actually implementing Sacrosanctum Concilium in a way that is rarely seen in the post-Conciliar liturgical world.

They're taking the Council's injunction seriously, quite seriously, to teach the faithful to "say or sing in Latin those parts of the Mass that pertain to them." Not only that, they are taking the admirable goals of the pre-conciliar Liturgical Movement, esp. the work of Justine Ward and Dom Beaudoin, et al, by training young children (8 and 9 years old) to sing the full propers of the Graduale Romanum, and, interestingly enough, as you'll see in this video, their young boys' schola is almost entirely directed by a young boy!! What's more, this young schola sings the parts of the Ordinary antiphonally with the congregation---and, from what it looks like, without adult intervention and direction at all.

http://www.laportelatine.org/mediatheque/videotheque/cacqueray_villepreux_131012_et_13/messe_et_consecration_villepreux_131013.php

Pope Benedict, when he was Cardinal Ratzinger, called for a new Liturgical Movement, precisely because, in his words, the old Liturgical Movement had"been "hijacked." Could it be, mirabile dictu, that it is SSPX France that is leading the way in teaching the faithful to take at long last their proper place in the Mass by singing Gregorian chant as envisioned by both the pre-Conciliar popes and the Second Vatican Council?

For this, they are to be saluted and emulated, because they are showing us an enlightened paradigm by which the "liturgical reconciliation" so ardently desired by Pope Benedict can finally be realized. In a true example of liturgical progressivism, they are showing us that the EF Latin Mass, when fully actualized, according to the teaching of the popes in the liturgical documents, offers every bit as much participation as does the Ordinary Form (a thought eloquently expressed by the English priest Fr. John Parsons).

It seems to me that this splendid example of congregational participation should serve as an encouragement to the whole Church and the message is very simple: if SSPX France can do it, so can we!

Joyeux Noel!