How To Handle This Situation???

Question

A divorced mother is choosing to raise her son as a Jehohvah's Witness. The father, who has visitation rights access, is NOT a JW. What should the father's position be, during the son's visits? Should he restrict his chosen activities during his son's visits, based solely on the MOTHER'S "beliefs", if he does NOT share those "beliefs"?

Answer 1

The child shouldn't be raised in any religion. Children lack the intellectual maturity to make informed, objective decisions about religion, and if he is raised as a Jehovah's Witness he will likely never have that objectivity.

Answer 2

I don't think he should overly restrict activities,but take the son's feelings in the matter into consideration, perhaps a comprise could be found, without disrespecting the mothers wishes.
He should not bash the mothers religion, but respectfully! let the son know that he does not share her view and there are other paths out there that when he(the son) is of age he may investigate, and chose for himself which is right for him , emphases on investigating the options carefully before making a decision....
Of course ...depending on age/maturity of child... will determine how much detail the father should use...wouldn't want to upset/ confuse the boy.

Answer 3

As a father's rights representative for 20 years, this will take me a moment to write.

I’ve worked with divorced and single fathers since 1989. I developed an educational manual for fathers that on dealing with issues related to visiting fathers. This is an issue faced by thousands of fathers, of many religions.

The problem here is that the children will be spending the majority of their time with the mother, so trying to disrupt what she is teaching them, provided it is not clearly harmful to them physically, can only lead to problems. Consider if the father was or became a Christian, while the mother was Jewish. Many of the same differences apply.

One of the benefits of being raised a witness is that the children will receive a greater education in reading. They will have their own Bibles and will be reading them on a regular basis. They will learn how to be teachers, as children attend ministerial school, right along with the parent(s). They also learn how to do research, as witnesses are taught how to look things up in sources other than that of the Watchtower.

I advise to be a father. I know it will be hard, but leave the religious issues alone, all he will do is confuse the children and perhaps alienate them from him. This does not mean not giving them Christmas gifts, as he will do that anyway, just understand if the children say that they don’t observe the holiday. Consider just giving them gifts, throughout the year, instead of following the old ritual of telling children that if they are not good they won’t get any gifts for Christmas, than give them anyway, regardless of how the children acted.

Consider one thing. A witness is less likely to violate the court ordered visitation, which happens 60% of the time, according to a study done by the U.S. Dept. of Health and Human Services. This is very common with members of other religions, who think it is okay to sin, as they will be forgiven, regardless of what they do. One thing I will say, in all the years I’ve don’t this, I’ve only had one case where a witness mother was violating the court orders.

On this note, I imagine everyone has seen the news report about Bobby Brown being jailed for not paying child support. How often do you hear about a mother being jailed for violating the same court orders as regard visitation rights? As I stated above, 60% of father will be denied access to their children, regardless of court orders. The study also says they will lose all contact with the children within five years.

Answer 4

If he were to change who and what he is, it would be a deception. It would be destructive and wrong to criticize his X's believes and practices or purposely break any of the stated rules she lives by. The father should be able to have input in how his son is raised and although learning a belief structure young is good, it needs to be a guide, not an absolute. The bottom line is we were all given free will and any efforts to control or limit possible choices is extremely damaging to a young mind. Both parents need to make sure not to use this hungry, learning child as a pawn in their struggle to find their own way.

Answer 5

I'm not sure I understand the question. Should the father restrict which activities?

If you mean should dad attend church with the kid, then I say no, that's not necessary.

If you mean dad shouldn't take the kid to, say, the zoo because mom thinks naked gorillas are sinful (or something), then again, no, because that's just stupid.

I think you mean that, for the child's sake, Dad shouldn't go out of his way to offend Mom's religious sensibilities; and while I'm usually not very sympathetic to the feelings of godders, I could grudgingly agree with that premise. That doesn't mean the kid can't have any fun with Dad, and it doesn't even mean that the kid can't do things with Dad that he wouldn't get to do with Mom. I mean that Dad will have to consider carefully the possible results of an afternoon spent looking at dinosaur bones in a museum versus an afternoon of tossing frisbees in the park.

Answer 6

Depends on the age of the child. He should at least look into the beliefs of the JW's to begin with and take it from there.

He has to honor the upbringing the mother gives him if she has full custody and he has only visitation rights. The dad can at least explain the tenents of his own faith when the boy is ready without making the boy practice that faith. My Catholic friend and he Jewish husband raised their 3 daughters Catholic -- but they know and celebrate the Jewish holidays, too.

Answer 7

I think it would be in the child's best interest to learn about every religion that is out there and choose for himself what activities he would like to participate in. If the father wants him to be exposed to his beliefs and the son is okay with it, that should happen. If the son, while visiting with the father, still wants to participate in his mother's church activities that should happen too.

Answer 8

All of this depends on the divorce decree. If you are talking about his personal behavior at home then I would in general say, "No." If however, you are talking about religious education, then that would most certainly depend on the divorce decree. Divorce decrees contain various agreements and mandates from the judge. These must be followed if the father doesn't want to find himself in contempt of court.

Answer 9

As long as the father conducts himself in an open, positive, gentle and honest manner. This means saying "I believe that..." not "Listen, your mother's a nutcase"
For the sake of the child, the parents must agree to disagree.

Answer 10

no, because the father doesn't believe in it, and the son's gonna see behavior from other anyway.
unless the son wants the father to try and restrict himself