We have learned that our DS4 wants the facts. I don't think he really understands death, and we haven't gone through any obsessing or much questioning about it yet, even though our cat died last year and a close family friend died recently. We just explain what happens to the body in a matter of fact way, and say that the soul never goes away, and that is where all the love is.
Re: religion. We don't go to church, but DS4 attends a preschool that is in a church. They do a few things related to religious holidays, but not much. DS asked about Jesus last Easter, and I told him that lots of people believe that Jesus died and then came back from the dead on Easter. He said, "Well, I don't believe THAT." I was a bit surprised at his answer, because we hadn't talked about it all before so I don't know how he could make up his mind so quickly. I do try to teach him to respect whatever anyone believes, though. I have a book that sounded good, but that we haven't read yet, describing what God means in different religions.
What is God I see the author also has one on death-
What is Death We did have a period of time, when DS was 3, when he insisted that there were ghosts in our house. I said, oh, you have a pretend ghost? And he was very serious and said it was a real ghost. I think he truly believed this, and as we do live in a 125-year-old house, I guess anything's possible. As he would not quit talking about this ghost, I sat him down for a ghost talk. I said that some people believe there are ghosts and some people do not. Some people who believe in ghosts think that they just got lost on the way to heaven. I told him the next time he saw the ghost to tell it to go towards the light and then it would get to heaven. After that talk, DS never talked about the ghost again. (OK, reading through this, it all seems a bit odd, but I'm curious if any other kids have had ghost obsessions?)
