gdnubin,
Your JW girlfriend cannot possibly keep up a relationship "outside the faith" and keep on good terms with her family. Her family will work at breaking the two of you up, hence her request that you drop the "labels" and not let her family know that you are still "friends."
If they were to find out, they might take the matter to the elders -- report her -- and were the elders to ask the right questions, the fact of your intimacy will be out of the bag and she WILL be disciplined. Whether she is reproved or disfellowshipped would depend upon her connections in the Kingdom Hall and whether or not she would promise never to see you again.
That she flip-flopped on her decision to break it off from morning to evening shows just how conflicted she is. She obviously cares for you very much. But to continue the relationship with you openly OR should you actually offer her marriage WILL mean cutting her off completely from her family or friends. (Well, perhaps not if the two of you married... it would depend on the climate at her Kingdom Hall.)
It would be terribly cruel of you to ask her to do that if you are not seriously contemplating sharing the rest of your life with her in a LEGAL way. I am getting the feeling from your posts, however, that you could foresee this relationship ending in marriage.
If it should, you should also know that no self-respecting Jehovah's Witness would EVER leave the choice of religion up to the child. (Trust me, I'm an ex-JW who was married to a divorced Catholic with 1 child!, and I believed the Bible's admonition to "train up a boy according to the way, when he grows old he will not depart from it.")
The Witnesses commend pregnant women for reading My Book of Bible Stories to their in utero children as science has shown that the fetus can be stimulated by reading and music. (The conditioning thus begins before birth!) There will be pressure from her family to bring the children of your union to all meetings and out in field service and also not to celebrate those awful, worldly holidays.
It was a very stressful tightrope I was always walking trying to please both my husband and what the Watch Tower Society told me was Jehovah's will (and myself?).
Thankfully, my husband insisted our children attend parochial school (if you could afford it, that might be a good idea for you, too) so there was evidence all around them that Jehovah also listened to the prayers of sincere Catholics... Plus they got comparative religion even though my husband is not a practicing Catholic.
Imagine if your children should one day choose to become Witnesses, too. No holiday feasts with them, no birthdays... just "get togethers." No joyful worship, either.
It is, indeed, a difficult situation, and I truly wish you both joy and happiness if you can find them.
outnfree
