It’s the tearful and frightening days, the apocalyptic days, that teach the most valuable lessons. We tell our children the truth on those days. We don’t worry too much about overwhelming their emotions because the context of these conversations is almost always prayer. “Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.” 

Children don’t have to be the impossibly fragile abstractions of our cultural imagination. They can understand hard things from a young age; they can gaze upon Christ crucified and understand, even if only very dimly, that he shares their burdens; and they can be strengthened by him, even if they can’t yet describe what that means.

Everything will not be OK. How do we best help children learn this?