Comments on: How Much God Is Too Much?

By: AnonyMouse

AnonyMouse — Wed, 29 Apr 2009 21:14:35 +0000

Hmm… I suppose I’ll have to worry about this once I’ve adopted my future atheist minions. If they had already been taught that their parents were in Heaven, I think I’d let them hang onto that idea as long as it made them happy, but I certainly wouldn’t reinforce it by encouraging them to be religious. On the other hand, if they hadn’t been taught about an afterlife, I’d probably tell the kid that his/her parents were safe. Maybe hedge my bets a little and say that they were happy together and that we would all end up together one day.

Hey, if being happy is the absence of misery, death must be ecstasy.

By: Dale McGowan

Dale McGowan — Wed, 17 Dec 2008 21:39:47 +0000

There are so many myths tangled up in this. One is that religion cures the fear of death. Another is that there are no consolations in the naturalistic view. Both wrong.

During a recent conversation, my six-year-old daughter expressed a sobbing, anguished fear of dying. If the only way around her anguish was a lie, I’d lie like a rug. Instead I first empathized with the fear, then offered the greatest consolation of all time: the Lucretian symmetry argument.

“Where were you a hundred years ago? Before you were born?”

“What do you mean, where was I? I wasn’t anywhere!”

“And were you afraid?”

“Of course not! How could I be afraid when I wasn’t…” Her eyes got wide. “OMIGOSH, IT’S EXACTLY THE SAME!”

She laughed. At the age of six, she laughed at death. Beat that, Jehovah.

(Complete conversation here.)

By: ThatOtherGuy

ThatOtherGuy — Tue, 16 Dec 2008 21:28:36 +0000

I’d probably just tell my kids that nobody knows what happens after you die, because nobody’s come back to tell us :p

It’s certainly not lying!

By: Froynlaven

Froynlaven — Tue, 16 Dec 2008 21:04:24 +0000

I have a new idea about the subject.
I’ve heard cases where children brought up with no religion might become fundamentalists later on in life, kinda like how overprotected children will party too hard when they first get to college.
I’d like to try bringing my kids up as true Pastafarians. Give them the Flying Spaghetti Monster version of heaven so they can believe in it, just like Santa. This way you can teach them about Christianity and other religions but say that “our religion is the FSM”. They get awesome stories about midgets and pirates and get to believe in a heaven.
Then When they’re older you can reveal that, much like Santa or Jesus, it’s just something fun for kids to believe in.

By: Children, God and Death » The Antichristian Phenomenon

Children, God and Death » The Antichristian Phenomenon — Tue, 16 Dec 2008 20:31:54 +0000

[...] Atheist pointed to this dilemma, with his post on the subject (you can see my response to his post and to the general question below), and a link to an article [...]

By: postsimian

postsimian — Tue, 16 Dec 2008 17:38:47 +0000

I’m planning on taking the same approach as SarahH with my kids. One of them is 18 months old and the other is due in February, but it’s something I’ve been thinking about.

By: SarahH

SarahH — Tue, 16 Dec 2008 15:22:01 +0000

I’m with the “don’t lie to your kids” camp on this one. That doesn’t mean that you have to go all Jack Handy on them though. I would be honest but broad – I would tell them that I don’t know about what happens after we die for sure, and that lots of people believe different things. If pressed, I would explain that I think the important thing is that we remember the lessons we learned from the people who die, pass on their stories and keep the happy memories.

By: TheDeadEye

TheDeadEye — Tue, 16 Dec 2008 14:39:40 +0000

I’d be wary of letting kids think that recycling/decomposing (worm food) equals eternal consciousness. Dead people are dead. No thoughts. No life. End of line.

By: Asad

Asad — Tue, 16 Dec 2008 13:03:17 +0000

I do believe in an afterlife including heaven and hell, but I think even if I didn’t I would not think of death as the end. While it may be an end of the combination of features and traits defined as the self, it is only a transition for the matter and energy that make us up. As the previous commentor said, we become part of other organisms as well as the earth and the atmosphere. Even after the earth is gone, our matter and energy could become part of the stars. One does have to be careful not to mislead children into believing in reincarnation, but one can show children that death is not a complete end to everything within us.

By: Yvette

Yvette — Tue, 16 Dec 2008 06:40:51 +0000

I think telling a child a lie to make them feel better will do nothing but cause more grief later on. It’s better for a child to learn to deal with death and grief early, instead of lying and delaying the inevitable. It will only result in the child losing trust in their parents and adults, and having to deal with the loss anyways. I don’t think refusing to lie to a child and cause more pain later on is horrible and militant atheism.

What’s the best solution? Honesty, I think. “I don’t know” is probably the best answer, and letting the child know that this is how life works but that their parent WILL continue to live on in certain ways: if I were a parent trying to explain this, I would tell them that the dead parent has become a part of everything within the world, from the air to the trees to the ground, and that they continue to live on in this way, and be with us, even if we can’t see them. This would probably instill respect for the world and all things while comforting them and allowing them to deal with death realistically (as it’s not a lie, as scientifically we do all recycle, though frankly idiotic burial traditions slow this process down).