Children and religion

I have never been especially religious, but then again, I am pretty sure I conflated God with Santa Claus and the Easter bunny back before I was 10 years old.

Sometimes, you gotta play the game, though. That I did recognize while young.

 

When my dad died, I asked my mom, with whom I am always uncomfortable having any kind of serious conversation with, for various reasons, to please leave the religion and afterlife discussions with my son to my wife and I. We really worked hard at it, and had a really good sit-down conversation with him. My wife consulted child psychology experts both online and within her school system. We had the same conversation with him after my wife's brother died.

But yet, my mother simply flat-out will not adhere to our wishes. It's frustrating. I don't think she's trying to be disrespectful. I really don't. I just think she: (1) Doesn't listen; and (2) Could not even fathom a world in which she isn't permitted to just ramble on about religion to a young child.

Anyway, I stopped by her house on the way home from work the other day just to say hello, and she volunteered that the other day, my son asked her out of the blue, "How did Grandpa get to heaven?" (We've tried to explain to him that we don't know if heaven is real or not, that it's one possibility, and we don't know where it is if it does exist.) She proudly said, "I just told him that the angels came down and flew him up there!" I said, "Mom, the answer to that question is, 'We don't know.'" And she responded, "He doesn't accept that answer! But he seemed satisfied with what I told him."

It's a tough spot. I don't know whether to just let it go, sit down with her again, or what. I don't know whether it's doing any harm at all. Hell, we do Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny in our house. Religion feels heavier, though, and I wish my mom wasn't taking it upon herself to dictate all this to him as incontrovertible fact.

 

When my wife's grandfather and my grandmother both died within a couple months of each other, my kids were both really, really young and without hiding it from them, we shielded them from it, not taking them to see my wife's grandfather during his final month in the hospital when things were getting particularly grisly. My grandmother was back in California, so that wasn't an issue. We didn't take them to either funeral.

It was explained to both kids, who were 5 and 3 at the time, that both lived very long lives and were in heaven, although if heaven really exists, I seriously doubt my wife's grandfather would have made the cut...

My 5-year-old asked if they were with our dog, who died when he was 2 and when we said yes, he seemed to like that...

 

More than just the religion aspect, I hate that he's had to be exposed to this fact of life at such a young age. It's devastating sometimes to hear him happily playing with his toys, and then talk about how some Lego person, "got old and then their (sic) died," really matter-of-factly. We got a Ted Williams throwback card in a Topps pack the other day, and I excitedly told him about how he was an old-time baseball player who was great. And at the end he added, as if you can't leave off this important part, "Yeah, and then he died."

Heart-breaking.

 

I assume your mother told you the same things as a child. Is that part of your problem in this instance?

 

Strange as this answer will seem, no, it's not. I have no unresolved angst about my childhood religious upbringing. I have issues about my mother's hostility toward math and science, but I don't think that was related to religion. I think it was related to her being intimidated by math and science.

It's more about it not being her job, in this case, to handle this aspect of his development.

 

I don't think there's anything scarring about being told about heaven as though it's fact. If your son is smart, he'll figure it out quickly. No need to lecture him at a young age. Wait until he asks what Ted Williams' WAR was before he died.

 

It feels cruel to tell children they are going to live forever. It's devastating when we realize later that we probably aren't.

 

Dick, from my experience, when death is introduced to a child - whether it's couched in religion or not - the kid talks about death/dying for a while. I think it's just a difficult concept and the adding 'then he died' to everything is just.... working it out?

One way past what your mom is doing (which seems to be a mom thing more than a religion thing ) is to casually mention to your kid that, you know, sometimes daddy and grandma think different things ... and that, you know, sometimes grownups don't know everything.

 

Devastating? I can't imagine that reaction from a 10-year-old.

I also don't think the typical feeling about heaven is that it equals immortality.

 

Thinking more about a 30- or 40-year-old.

 

I would hope your son is smart and cynical enough to come to grips with the reality of death before getting to be that old.