Catholic Social Science Review

Volume 12, 2007

Experiences from Forty Years in the Wilderness
Teaching at a Secular University about Family and Politics

As a professor in a secular university for forty years, my teaching responsibility has been to teach students of political science as well as I could. Mere worldly success depends on doing that, as well as on being a successful scholar, as the profession and ones colleagues define successful. As a Christian, one's salvation depends partly on how conscientiously one fulfills these worldly responsibilities to others. "Thou shah not steal" and "Thou shall love thy neighbor as thyself" It is obviously a challenge to try to sanctify one s daily professional work but it is not impossible. The following is a record of how one man has attempted to do that in the admittedly unpromising environment of a secular university. Perhaps these experiences and reflections on them may be useful for others who are considering an academic career.