Koanfusion Is the Only Solution
Insight magazine reports in its June 12 issue on a ruling made by the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in favor of the American Civil Liberties Union Officially adopted on October 1, 1959, at the suggestion of a 12-year-old boy, the banned state motto is taken from a passage in Matthew (19:26) that reads: “Jesus…said to them, ‘With men this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.'”
Needless to say, Ohio needs a new state motto. Insight recounts some of the suggestions made by vexed Ohioans to the Cleveland Plain Dealer, which range from the cutely obvious, “With a Lack of Values Anything Is Probable,” to the bitingly appropriate, “Render Unto Caesar What Is Caesar’s; Render Unto ACLU What Is God’s.”
We would like to weigh in with what we consider to be the best fence-mending, issue-sensitive twist on the old motto, guaranteed to appeal to the entire spectrum of religious and irreligious diversity. We offer: “Anything Is Possible — Or Not.”
This new-and-improved motto is innocuous enough for all to enjoy, and in no way promotes the establishment of a state religion. One might say that it succeeds where its predecessor failed by simply establishing nothing. And that nothingness is what makes it so…profound. Think of it as an answer to a Zen Koan. (Zen is not, properly speaking, a religion.)
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