Dear Moneyologist,

I’m asking your counsel on the money we give our children every year at Thanksgiving, specifically to one of them. This past week I learned that my son, a self-employed and so far successful electrician, for the last two years, and his wife, a stay-at-home mom with no prospects for high wages, have been tithing $150 every week to her church. This is her church because my son is, like me, not religious and doesn’t attend. When I heard about the tithing, it occurred to me that I, a Jewish deist, am funding her preacher in (expensive) sunny southern California.

Here’s some background: My wife and I are both 68 years old, we both grew up poor, are married 46 years and are still in love (that is, there is no chance of divorce). I’m retired from the Army (36 years) with a $4,000 per month pension. Our accounts somehow total about $1 million, 60/40 in bonds/stocks. They’re diversified enough, probably too conservatively allocated, but it allows me not to become too worried about the next market meltdown. We have no debts, not even on a house or car.

Determined to die broke, for the last eight years we have been giving our three adult children about $7,500 each year at Thanksgiving. We think they need the money more now, while they have small children (our grandchildren), than inheriting a larger amount when we die in 10 or 20 years. As we get older and become increasingly sure that we will not become destitute in our last years, we intend to increase that amount. We’re satisfied our children aren’t using the money for gold faucets.

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It goes without saying that my son has no IRAs or plans for his retirement. He said, when I asked about this, “I don’t expect to live that long.” He’s a great electrician but not too smart in other areas. I take responsibility for that. Of course, I’ve offered to educate him on finances but he’s never asked me to, I think because he’s determined to look like he’s standing on his own feet. So, finally, here’s the question: How can I continue to give my son’s sisters their annual gift but not give my son — and his wife?

I wouldn’t mind so much if it were $150 every month. I’ve pointed out the thousands of dollars his wife is giving to the church could be spent on “shoes” for their children. He supports her, told me his electrician business started to do well because of the tithing. As I said, he is not too smart in other areas.

I’m thinking I should open a Simple Employment Pension Plan IRA for my son — traditionally used by the self-employed or small-business owners — or some other account and put his annual gift there. (Thirty years from now, when he’s 67, he’d have something to show for the money we’d given him.) My son would say I didn’t trust him as much as my daughters who are getting cash, but that’s an argument I’m willing to lose if it means his retirement isn’t spent under an overpass.

Is there more to this, or a better solution, I haven’t thought of?

Sean in San Antonio

Dear Sean,

Your dilemma concerns both financial logistics and familial etiquette.

This requires a two-pronged response: I will enlist a financial planning expert to tell you what you can do, and then suggest how I think you ought to approach it. The SEP IRA doesn’t look like a good fit for this situation, says Neal Slafsky, a Fort Lauderdale, Fla.-based managing director at financial life management firm United Capital. He doesn’t think it would be easy for a father to fund a son’s SEP IRA with an annual gift as the SEP must be funded from earned income. (Alternatively, your son could use the gift for household expenses and pledge to open up an SEP with his own money.)

I give my son money, his wife gives it to Church

There are other options, however. Slafsky says you could create an irrevocable trust for your son’s benefit. “The trust could state the main purpose was to provide for your son’s benefit in retirement,” he says. The annual gift would be made to the trust and you can serve as the trustees. “You could also add a provision to the trust that no trust funds were to be used to fund any religious organization,” he adds. He says you would have the discretion to distribute money to support your son’s health, education and any other purpose.

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And so we come to the etiquette part. If you don’t set up a trust, then after you give this money to your son, the money technically becomes his — not yours. If there are strings attached, they have cut them long before your son’s wife crosses the threshold of her church. By giving it, you feel like you have a stake in how they live their lives and also what his wife does during her spiritual downtime. Whether or not I agree with her tithing $150 a week, my answer would be the same: These are not your decisions to make for them.

If you treat one child differently than the rest, it will create discord in your family, and could ultimately result in putting distance between you and your son (and his family). In other words, something good (your gift) turns into something bad (family drama). If you do set up a trust, do it for all your children, without giving a reason. I offer you one word of caution: Even if you did that, your son’s wife would likely spend $150 a week at the church of her choice regardless, so by giving them $7,500 you are putting that money back in their pockets.

In biblical terms, it’s bread on the water. Let the dough go.

Do you want to know what happened? Read here in The Moneyologist Revisited.

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Do you have questions about inheritance, tipping, weddings, family feuds, friends or any tricky issues relating to manners and money? Send them to MarketWatch’s Moneyologist and please include the state where you live (no full names will be used).

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(This story was republished.)