Confession: A Catholic Jesuit Priest Forgives a Non-Tenured "Professor"

[Imaginary dialogue based on Catholic confessions I willingly endured during my Catholic adolescence in the 1960s; doubtless the format/questions/vocabulary have much changed since that epoch.]

Georgetown adjunct professor  [GAP, yours truly]:

Bless me Father, for I have sinned.

Priest:

I bless you, my son. What do you confess?

GAP:

I have been teaching courses at Georgetown University on American foreign policy, off and on for over a decade.

Priest:

So what is your sin? After all, teaching is not a sin, if practiced in the right way.

GAP:

Father, excuse my materialist concerns, I just don't think my students are getting their money's worth.

Priest:

My son: Money is only part of the moral universe.

GAP:

Thank you for your kindness, Father. But Father, although I was honored to receive a Ph.D from Princeton University, and then went on to be a Senior Foreign Service Officer in the United States Foreign Service with many awards, and have many publications (some actually quite "scholarly") I am not a tenured professor.

Priest:

So why should all this bother you, my son?

GAP: Because my students' parents -- and the students themselves -- are paying extravagant costs for a college education, expecting, I assume, the best and the brightest academic pedagogues, who -- as they fully deserve  -- get a full salary.

And by the "best professors," I mean those who have tenure and are respected by their professional academic colleagues, and have taught for many years.

I am not in their league, Father, as they have made abundantly clear for over a decade.

And yet students and their hard-working parents are paying high prices for non-tenured academic hired-hands such as I "instructing" them.

Should not the "real" professors teach students more than they do?

Priest: 

My son -- Much are you getting remunerated for teaching your course (s), now over a decade?

GAP:  A couple of thousand dollars per course, Father, without insurance or any assurance of permanent employment.

Priest:

Do you feel exploited?

GAP: Father, with all due respect:  My consolation is Christ on the crucifix.

Priest:

Say three Hail Marys and go back to the books before you pretend to be a "professor." Roma locuta est; causa finita est.


Full disclosure: I was reprimanded by a Georgetown dean for distributing photocopied materials in one of my classes, which included non-copyrighted speeches by American presidents (Wilson, Roosevelt, Truman).