Self-described radical feminist theologian Mary Daly appears in Middlesex Superior Court in Cambridge, Monday. (AP Photo)

CAMBRIDGE - A self-described radical feminist theologian who barred men from her Boston College seminars is not automatically entitled to teach at the school, a judge ruled Monday.

The decision did not address whether Professor Mary Daly can legally refuse to teach men in her feminist seminars.

The judge said, however, that a school has the authority to set its own policies: including insisting that all courses be open to both male and female students.

"A professor's defiance of that policy -- in this case, a vehement and very public defiance -- would give the school ample grounds for her termination,'' Judge Martha Sosman wrote in a two-page decision.

Daly, best known for works such as "Gyn/Ecology: The Metaethics of Radical Feminism'' and "Outercourse,'' claims the Jesuit-run school pushed her out when threatened with a lawsuit by a male student. The school says she retired when she was ordered to teach men.

At issue in a Middlesex Superior Court hearing Monday was whether Daly's feminist classes should be placed on a roster of courses for next semester.

Sosman denied Daly's request for a preliminary injunction to force the school to include her in the course catalogue. BC had stripped her courses from next semester's listings after the dispute arose.

The case will now proceed, essentially, as a contract dispute matter.

Daly, 70, has sparred with college administrators before over whether she can teach women-only sections, but this is the first time their long-standing battle has reached the courts.

In the field of feminist studies, Daly is considered a pioneer and has long been a controversial figure at the Catholic institution where she has worked for more than 30 years.

When she first arrived at BC in 1966, Daly taught only men. The school of arts and sciences didn't admit women until 1970. Soon after, Daly said, she found that men and women in feminist courses didn't mix.

So she barred men from her seminars, although she said she does teach males in separate one-on-one sessions. She estimated fewer than two dozen men have taken her up on her offer.

When men are in a class with women, she said Monday before her court case began, "the dynamic is totally interrupted.''

She says women will cater to men in the class, and often won't say what's really on their minds.

The litigation originated last fall, when senior Duane Naquin was kept out of Daly's course on introductory feminist ethics. He charged discrimination, and ended up with legal backing from the Center for Individual Rights in Washington, D.C., whose lawsuit ended affirmative action at the University of Texas.

Fearful of a lawsuit, BC asked Daly to take Naquin into her spring course. Daly said she refused and took a leave of absence instead.

The college, however, insists that Daly agreed to retire.

Although Daly still has an office at the school and receives the same salary of about $43,000 annually, the school says that will change after a year.

School officials say they can't allow her to continue teaching under "separate but equal'' courses, which they argue violate federal anti-discrimination laws.

Daly believes she is not violating the federal law known as Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972. She says the law was designed to improve the situation of women -- which, she says, is what she's doing.

Gretchen Van Ness, Daly's attorney, said BC has used "backdoor tactics'' to fire a tenured professor because she disagreed with them. Van Ness said the case could have sweeping ramifications for academic freedom.

Tenure is the system that protects professors from being fired for their views.

"As a tenured faculty member, Professor Daly is entitled to due process,'' Van Ness said. She can't be terminated and she can't be excluded from the classroom without some kind of hearing.''