Someone with some life experience please advise me where I am losing the high ground. If they were to call me on this particular board, or """"apostacy"""" in general, where would I gain the high ground by dissembling or lying by omission? To my mind, I would strengthen my father's faith if he had the unfortunate satisfaction of sticking to his guns in refusing to see his apostate son.
Your father is dying and you're worried about the high ground???? Strengthening your father's faith by letting him refuse to see you? Man, that's twisted.
You're making this all about you. About your pride, about your stubborness. This is about your father first, then you.
Play along with him. Placate him. Make him feel good to the best of your ability. Letting him continue to shun you isn't going to make him happy. What? He's supposed to admire you for taking your stand and feel good that he can take his?
Don't let him know about your posting on this board. I don't know how old your father is. But I do know that elderly people don't generally surf the internet. And loyal, stubborn JWs don't visit apostate sites. And if your dad is a bit younger, he's probably still not surfing this site. The odds are remote that he knows you post here.
He might wonder whether you are in contact with "apostates" over the internet. My dad once told me he heard there were a lot of apostates where I live and asked whether I was talking to them. I hadn't met any ex-JWs. My "apostacy" was due to Ray Franz's book before I even moved here and what I read on the internet before I ever joined this board. They hear these things. They assume you might have been lured away by the internet. Don't confuse that with any specific knowledge that you are on this particular board. Don't admit to as soon as he mentions apostates on the internet. That doesn't mean he knows. rmt1 could be anybody unless you've mentioned specifics about your town or used real names.
You may have been fed up with the lies you were taught and don't want to lie further, but what good does it do to upset your dad on his deathbed?
I've gone through similar things. I faded. I was never DA or DF. My dad knows I have "apostate" thinking. We've even discussed some of it, but it usually leads to him threatening to not talk to me anymore. Don't play "chicken" with your dad to see who will back down. When it's your last time with him, it's not worth it.
I'm stubborn too. I wanted to really get into it with my dad at times, but held my tongue. It infuriated me when he wrote me a letter trying to guilt me to come back. After several re-writes to tone things down, I sent him back a "thanks, but no thanks" letter that was (in my opinion) peaceful enough. Among other things, I stressed that I did still study the Bible, that there's one mediator between God and man, Jesus, and that I still believed many JW teachings. I didn't get specific and I didn't try to argue doctrine or show any sort of case against JWs. I stressed that I consider myself a good man, married, faithful to my wife, raising wonderful kids, don't smoke, hardly drink, etc. There's no need to tell him anything further.
I'm not saying you should do the same thing. The point is I said what I could to give my dad hope. His sincere hope is that I come back to the JWs. And if not, that I am at least the type of person to survive the big A. At different times, JWs have changed their opinions on who will and won't be saved. At least a few years ago, I think the opinion was that non-JWs might be coming along too.
What exactly does your family know about you? Or might they know? And why are you so concerned about this board? It seems to me there's more to the story you haven't mentioned.
