A few years ago, Paul Grundy contributed an article about his father's funeral - perfect description of what other posters have stated in this thread.
http://insidethewatchtower.com/doctrine/attending-my-father%E2%80%99s-funeral/
In my own case I sat through the funerals of my mother, my stepmother and father - and was so angry after each one that I truly wanted to do harm to the elders who gave the talks.
In the case of my father's funeral, I even prepared, with the help of my JW sister, a short biography that mentioned his love of sports, his service in the US Army during WW2 and some other accomplishments. I also mentioned that as a "shade tree mechanic" he often helped other JWs who could not afford to pay for car repairs to get their autos running again.
When I presented the additional remarks to the brother who was going to give the funeral talk, he never put up a fight and just agreed to add them to the biographical segment. I thought everything was OK and all bases covered.
When my brother and my daughters and I went to the funeral talk at the local Kingdom Hall, I was confident that no rules had been broken, that every base was covered and for once I would not leave angry as I had after my mother's funeral.
I can almost repeat word for word what was mentioned about my father:
"Brother 'Viejo' was born in April 1915 in Oklahoma. He married Sister 'Viejo' in 1942. They had two sons and one daughter. He had 8 grandchildren and 6 step-grandchildren. He and Sister Viejo became Jehovah's Witnesses in 1951 and served faithfully for 55 years. He was appointed an elder several times and he and his family moved to 'where the need was greater' in 1963, serving in two different mid-western states. He died faithful to Jehovah after a short illness."
After that one minute biography, the speaker just picked up from there and went back to the canned funeral talk, almost reading it word for word from the outline in front of him.
Needless to say, I am still mad about that whole affair years later. Later I found out what my sister and her family did with his remains. Maybe, since I was the first child and oldest son, I should have taken a more aggressive role - but that would not have been appreciated by my late father as he was a true JW kool-aide drinker.
When I share that store with my non-witness friends they are shocked and state that they would have come back to the funeral "packing heat."
Let's face it, JW funerals are ridiculous and have only one intent - and that is to try to convert the few non-JW family and friends that show up. Fat chance!
