How to Teach Children about Buddhism and Christianity
My wife and I have slightly different religious beliefs because of our backgrounds, and as a result we faced several issues trying to decide how to teach our children about religion. Our simple solution was to combine our beliefs and let our children decide what worked best for them. The hard part was determining how to go about doing this in a way that would not confuse our children. We ended up opting for a mix of discussion and reading that not only gave our children perspective, but helped them to learn on their own.
The first thing we did was to ask them what questions they were thinking about so that we could talk about how to answer them. It surprised us to hear that they had a lot of questions about death, God, and the afterlife (they were only 4 and 6 at the time). Once we had a good idea of what they were concerned with, we sat down while they were asleep and talked about ways we could objectively answer their questions.
Once we had some answers for them, we started longer discussions about more complex issues and told our children that we didn’t know the answers for certain and that the best we could do was stay as open minded as possible. We taught them that sometimes when you learn more, it can be more difficult to know the truth because you already have your mind made up. We wanted to impart upon them a lesson of wisdom and understanding that would help them weigh and balance the answers they would find on their own.
Lastly, we bought a bunch of books with different perspectives and read them together. We talked about where they were different and why that might be. We never said one was wrong or right, but simply asked them what they thought. Children are so innocent in their wisdom that I even learned quite a few lessons in the process. We encouraged them to think heavily about their thoughts, meditate on them, and ask us questions at any time. Although we didn’t talk about church, we did give them the option if they wanted that.
In the end, our children began to start thinking about spirituality, rather than trying to immediately answer all of their questions. Contemplative thinking is important and we wanted to make sure they made their own assumptions rather than just believe what their parents tell them. Sure, we sometimes worry we aren’t specific enough, but then we realize that each child walks their own path for the truth and it is up to them to find it along the way.