They're going to be chanting to the wrong God.

[Seax]

Chanting prayers sounds like religion to me.

-and it sounds like witchcraft to the nutbar who makes the disingenuous complaint out of his genuine frustration that the left exists..but in mere reality, it's neither.  

You can chant all sorts of prayers (and to all sorts of gods) in american schools, and not only does that not amount to a religion - it's legal.  He complains, very obviously, that it is illegal for him to do what he wants to do, that public schools will not help him create the society he wishes to see - and so to rail against the injustice of that, he insists that others are doing it.  It's never not projection.

Is social engineering not the purpose of state schooling? Mandatory government education is a product of Nineteenth Century nationbuilding, before that education was a religious, charitable or commercial, not a government, concern. One motive was that emerging nationstates of Europe wanted literate, numerate citizens for their economies and militaries, but equally important was instilling a sense of nationality & common loyalty to the state. This was especially important in countries like Germany, France or Italy where there was no homogenous common language; linguistic & ideologic unity would bring social & political unity.

It's completely disingenuous to pretend as though the author 'wants... public schools... [to] help him create the society he wishes to see' and is therefore wrongly 'insist[ing] that others are doing it.' He is certainly guilty of the first charge; he wants to use public schools for social engineering. He might also be guilty of hypocrisy if he denies that, I didn't read through the article so I can't say. But to pretend as though the current public education curriculum is apolitical and the author of the article is 'project[ing]' his desire to use them for social engineering onto the existing power structure is either hopeless ignorant or dishonest. Public education is inherently political, and always has been.