Not on University Time You're Not

Cohabiting professors at the University of St. Thomas in Minnesota are shocked over being told they work for an institution that believes there is such a thing as sin and therefore must get separate rooms when traveling with university students.

Ellen Kennedy and Leigh Lawton never thought their sleeping arrangement was an issue, but the university insists it goes against Catholic values.

Kennedy has been living with fellow professor, Leigh Lawton for twelve years. They are not married and both teach at the University of Saint Thomas which is a Catholic school.

"I'm not Catholic," says Kennedy, "Leigh is not Catholic and there has never been anything that's been forthcoming, that says these are the tenets of the Catholic Church."

Because Kennedy and Lawton aren't married, school officials say, they must book separate hotel rooms when on the road. But Kennedy says the real issue stems from a newspaper article in the November 11 edition of the campus newspaper about a former choir director at the school, who is gay. She canceled plans to travel with students to France after being told that having her partner travel with the choir presented a moral dilemma for students.