Breaking the News to Children

Watching the horror that devastated our nation after the terrorist attacks in New York and Washington, D.C. a small voice at my elbow said, "Is that a movie, or real Mom?"

My six-year-old was eyeing the carnage on television dispassionately. I had to decide how I would live with the damage after my explanation, one that would take the scales from those innocent green eyes.

There was no way around the truth. It was on every station. He has a seven-year-old brother and on the school bus tomorrow the truth would out. So I gathered the two boys and told them in broad strokes about bad people and bad things.

"Where was God?" the older boy asked.

"He was there," I answered.

"Why didn't God stop the bad people," the younger asked with an angry glare.

"We can never know how God thinks and why things go as they do," I said.

"We will go with what we do know. We know we are safe and others are not. There are people who need all our good thoughts, so we should not lose those right now."

"But it's not fair," said the older boy. "We should send our bombs and planes to go kill all of them."

"What we should do is take our minds away from death and anger and causing pain," I told them. "We are not fliers of planes or makers of bombs. We are keepers of hope."

My younger son nodded, "And that's an important job right?"

"Yes," I told him. "That's an important job."

So we all went back to work; keepers of the nation's lifeline to what is right and good and innocent still. We will find strength in our ability to contribute. We will find hope. And that may be the most curative power we possess.

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Contributed by Lisa Suhay suhays@comcast.net(Copyright (c) Lisa Suhay)
Lisa Suhay lives in Southern New Jersey. She is a correspondent for theNew York Times, a columnist for the Philadelphia Inquirer, and her books include"Tell Me a Story" life-lesson fables, available fromParaclete Press.Visit the author's site.