I have a short tale along these lines. When I was about to graduate highschool I was in a real rut. I was coming to terms with the fact that I didn't believe in God and was not participating in Youth for Christ and church the way I used to. The existential dread was hitting me hard. I think my parents probably picked up on this.

So I started looking at engineering schools because I knew I was interested in electronics design. By no means was I emphatically insisting upon any one secular school or being overtly rebellious towards my parents, who, despite their best efforts to shield me from the world with homeschooling and indoctrination, could see that I was drifting away. Out of nowhere one night on a drive home from a senior student event my father said "Your mother and I aren't going to pay for any of your school if you don't go to a Christian college." At that moment I resolved to take his money, go to some shitty christian school, graduate, blaze my own trail and never ask anything of him ever again.

Fast forward about 5 years after my Christian College graduation. For a long time I would go months without speaking to them. My mom and dad started trying desperately to be a part of my life. Pops is performing countless hours of work on my house free of charge. They offered me money to buy the house when I didn't even ask for it. They bring up church often and want me to go with them. I understand that they feel I am obligated to play along because of their generosity but they definitely don't understand my rejection of past emotional, spiritual and sometimes physical abuse that is sadly so pervasive in the fundamentalist homeschooling movement. It's not a world I want to be a part of. It's all madness. I don't discuss my unbelief at all with them - I just change the subject. They know nothing about my real personality. I'm all but mute around them.

I know that free money and gifts seems like an amazing thing for a parent to do and I'm a bit of spoiled brat for using them. I'm fairly certain they would outright disown me if I did tell them in a straight-forward fashion that I reject God. I guess it's better to live in this dishonest way instead - who knows.