"he is with God now"

ASA,
I live int he states, in the South. Many times, when someone dies, kids are told that person is gone to be with God. What do we, as Muslims tell OUR kids? I caught myself telling my 3 year old this when my mom had the television on, and the news channel was playing clips of Whitney Houston's funeral. I told him She died and she is with Allah (SWT) now. What should I be telling him about death??
JAK

At age 3, we kept it quite simple, when someone died it was because Allah wanted them to come back to Him and if they were good then Allah would show them Paradise in their graves which would make them very happy! We didn't touch on Hell/ sins etc at all because I think it is better to reinforce the good positive message and how good it is to do those things then to use scare tactics and terrify a young child with images of hellfire etc!

As they have got older (my daughter is now 5, almost 6) she is fully aware what happens, we explained that all children are innocent and will be looked after by the Prophet Ibrahim (as) until the Day of Judgement when Allah will decide who goes to Jannah. We try and conjure up wonderful images of Jannah for her, the special-nes it has and how pleased Allah will be with her and the people in Jannah. We have touched upon Hell and that this is a place for people who disobeyed Allah and He was unhappy with them, although He is so merciful if He wanted He could put everyone in Jannah and forgive them (we try and use this same concept between the siblings in that they should treat one another with mercy/ forgive one another when they argue etc!)

Hope that helps, it is a tricky subject to tackle but just be honest and use age appropiate language and images which you can build upon and expalin more as they get older.

I agree we should keep it simple with young children...most of us do not have enough information about what all happens after death to satisfy our own questions.

Also, it's always better that you introduce the concept of death than others.
That way, your child relates to what other people/TV friends say relative to what you've taught them.