Need help explaining God/Jesus, the whole religion thing to my 5 year old.

[SacharissaCripslock]

I don't belive in God and neither does my DH so I'm finding it difficult to explain stuff to my DS1.

I want to have faith - my DS2 died and I think if I believed in God and heaven I'd find great comfort in that and wish I could just flick a switch so I did believe.

So I'm quite happy to explain God in a positive light to my DCs - if they have faith then I'll be happy for them.

But I feel myself making a mess of it when I try to explain it - too busy doing the whole 'some people belive, but others don't, you can make up your own mind...blah blah blah' thing to get it right.

It's simple things like the reason for Christmas and Easter that I cock up. My DS doesn't even have the basics as since my DH and I don't belive we've never told him anything about God etc. He is home educated so doesn't get the info from school like other children do.

Does anyone know any good books aimed at children or links to websites? Not bible stories really, more just explaining the basics of who God and Jesus are and that kind of thing. Am I even making sense?

Eek
We have had the same problem (are atheists, hadn't talked much about the whole thing until school brought it up, obviously disallowing discussion isn't the way to go).

It's complicated by the fact that the reason for Christmas is tied up with the reason for Easter, and for a long time we were NOT happy to introduce the idea of death of the son as sacrifice for mankind's sins - it's brutal and cruel.

We say that all sorts of people have created all sorts of gods, and the one that gets the most press here at the moment is the Christian god. Then we waffle on about the others too and in fact have books about the Norse gods and the Greek ones (so far). School obviously provides the most information about Bible stories but if that's not an option for you then I'm stuck.

Sorry to read about your DS2 btw

Thank you UnePrune.

I'm glad you have posted so quickly too as I was really nevous posting in this topic.

I like the idea of books about Norse Gods and others - would be really interesting to learn about for not just my DS but for me too! Always the home educator.

I loved those stories as a child. They are as random and violent as the Old Testament stories in places.
We do talk about Jesus now that he's getting those stories at school. There must be loads of books with basic Bible stories, and then you can present them as you wish. Some people will present them as truth. You don't have to but they're interesting in themselves.

Of, sweetheart, I am so sorry about your ds2 .

FWIW I have faith in some kind loving force and an afterlife without that fitting into some religious framework. Barefoot Books is the place to look for stories from a variety of spiritual traditions that would be great for home ed.

Okay, this is the version my dc get, who are being brought up with a mix of Christian and pagan influences with a bit of Buddhism thrown in for good measure.

Jesus was a good man and teacher to the Jewish people. He taught people about loving one another and looking after those people that sometimes get ignored or that aren't liked. But his message was too dangerous for the Roman authorties (insert here references to Martin Luther King and Ghandi for older dc) so they killed him. Some people believe that they can experience Jesus now and they get a lot of help and comfort from that.

Some people believe that Jesus is the Son of God and that he died in order for there to be new life. This is very similar to old pagan beliefs about the Son/Sun God (you can add being born to a Virgin once ds gets this) who is sacrificed in the Autumn in order for there to be new life after the winter, so it is possible that a long time ago people took the life of Jesus and added to his story to fit their pagan beliefs.

(On a personal note the book The Mountains of Tibet might bring some comfort to your ds. It is a sweet little book about reincarnation.)

HTH

spiritmum, thank you so much, that post has been a lot of help.

Just had a look on the barefoot books site and it looks great. Can see my bank account taking a hit.

Hi, I used to do sunday school & still do school christain lunchtime club,I try to be good christain but fail every day!
So in a nutshell in my words, no offence to Biblical scholars
God created the world, he made Adam & Eve, they lived in paradise but they disobied God & had to leave the Garden of paradise(over egg how beautiful it was!) yrs went by there were lots & lots of people all over the world God had created, they loved God at first but soon forgot about him & became greedy & started to care about themselves more than looking after each other & living good life. God was very sad & he new the people he created had gone bad(ie like fruit goes bad/off) so he new he had to get rid of them, but he loved them so much he couldn't bring himself to do it, he new there was only one way to save people & that was to die for them/scarifice himself so they (the people)wouldn't have to die/ be got rid off . So he divided himself up into 3 parts, part of him stayed as God in the sky & part of him went down to Earth, before he could live on earth he had to be born like all babies so he lived inside Mary & was born at Christmas,all the people who saw the baby knew he was special, he grew up to be very clever & he spoke to lots of people about how to be good & live a happy life, he told them one day he would have to leave them & they would have to work out how to live a happy life by themselves, but he would still help them after he was gone as he would send the third part of himself to guide their thoughts,(holy spirit)it would be that little voice inside that tells you whats right & wrong.
Jesus was right he did have to leave them,what happened was this,the men who ran the churches got scared & fed up with the number of people who followed & listened to Jesus,they were jeaulous of him, so they decided to get rid of him, they took Jesus to the Romans who were in charge of everything at that time & said he had said bad things about them ,The Romans, eventally, the Romans said he would have to die , (he hadn't done anything wrong) Jesus died on a cross, that was one of the ways in those days they got rid of people, they didn't have jails like we do today etc etc.
Jesus died so that all the people on earth could live a happy life,3 days later he woke up/ came back to life & spoke to all his friends who had loved him, then went back up to heaven, but sent the third part of him to help the people to be happy & live a good life on earth.
People remember God coming to Earth as Jesus at Christmas & remember the time he left at Easter.
Sorry about the essay!

If you want to explain in a Christian context, you are going to need to include the Ressurrection and the Divinity of Jesus.

If you want to teach about religion more generally, then you could explain how Jews, Christians and Moslems all worship the same God in different ways.

If you want, as the OP suggests, to inspire faith, then I'd suggest you expose your daughter to faith in a positive way. If you want this to be the Christian faith, then take her to a friendly church.

You could try examples from literature: the classic example covering death and redemption is "The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe" (which is at heart a Gospel allegory), or perhaps also depending on the age of your DS, "HP and the Deathly Hallows".

Sorry, careless posting: I should have put "son" not daughter, and noticed he's five so the later HP should perhaps wait. I hope the rest of the post is helpful, tho'.

Thank you, onimolap and Quackmonster.

Quack, thank you for your "essay", it's perfect! Think I'll print your post so I can read it to my DS.

onimolap, I actually have The Lion, The Witch and The WArdrobe so could read that to him at bedtime, thanks for the idea.

You've all been very helpful and given me lots to think about and lots of idea.

Glad to be of help, good luck

This site - www.rejesus.co.uk/ is very good at doing explanations of the Christian faith so that you can help explain it to your child.

I would definitely read The Lion, the Witch & the Wardrobe (not the film, which is good but doesn't quite reveal the extent to which Aslan hands himself over to the White Witch to be killed instead of Edmund dying for the mistakes he has made).

A decent children's bible - ie. a book of bible stories www.amazon.co.uk/Childrens-Illustrated-Bible/dp/1405308281 is a good one

Thanks, DandyDan, have bookmarked that site to have a proper look later, and thanks for the book suggestion.

Have spoken to my DH and we're going to see if there's a Sunday School in town that we can send DS1 to. Was pleasantly surprised that my DH was happy to do this and wasn't resistant!

There are Sunday schools that reflect what goes on in church and then there are ones that are more like creches. You may need to shop around if you are after actual Bible stories and stuff.

You could go along and see what happens.

I don't think you can really explain God to a small child.

The Christian faith is a revealed faith, and it is something that is revealed over a long period of time. The best way to develop faith is to learn from other Christians.

I would suggest in your situation is to do something at the local church. There is Harvest coming up, and these are usually very visitor-friendly services. At Christmas time, many churches have Crib Services targeted at young children.

In the summer holidays, a holiday club is a fantastic way for children to experience the Christian faith.

It's important not to under-estimate how a child accepts the Christian faith. They are much more accepting that adults because they are not skeptical and do not over-intellectualise.

I tell my ds who is five that God created the world, but that the people of the earth weren't living as He had intended them to because they were hurting each other and fighting all the time, so He sent his Son, Jesus, to show people the right way to live.

The way I explain God (as opposed to any religious doctrine) is that God is the name for the creative energy in the Universe. People over time have given this energy human characteristics as a way of understanding or coming close to God, and also as a way of understanding the good and bad things that happen. But because God is a loving energy everything that is created is good; we just don't always understand how that can be.

I experience this energy in a sunset, in the power of the waves at the beach, in a gale force wind, in a gentle rainfall. I see it in an old tree and in a rosebud. I see it when I look into the eyes of my child. And I know that this energy is inside me and insde you and inside everyone.

There' san old Native American story about the wise animals deciding hwere to put the secret of the nature of the universe. The owl suggests the moon, but the other animals say that no, one day people will work out how to go there and will pollute and desecrate it. So the whale decides that the bottom of the ocean would be good, but the other animals point out that even the oceans will be plundered without any thought. Then teh mouse says, 'I know, why not put the secret of the universe inside them? They'll never think of looking for it there.'

SC, I'm so sorry about your ds2 . And fwiw, I've had similar struggles talking about God and spirituality generally to my eldest dd (now 6). Hopefully, our efforts to muddle through and be as honest as possible will help our children find their own way - its not straightforward for most of us, I think.

Spiritmum, I love that NA story...and many others. I think their teachings are closest to what I can relate to.

Sorry, just come back to this thread. Thank you all so much for posting, and such thoughtful posts.

spiritmum, really love that whole post!