The peacetime setting of THE BEST YEARS OF OUR LIVES side-steps any direct cinematic engagement with the war itself, but the morality of war is an old quandry. Fortunately, being Catholic means being the recipient of millennia of sustained meditation on the big moral questions of life, like what makes for a just war and how we ought to consider the trauma of those who fight. Dr. Melanie Barrett, professor of moral theology at the University of St. Mary of the Lake, joins me to talk about minute 58 which gives us a good excuse to talk about some of those big questions. We also find time to talk about the movie as a whole which gives Dr. Barrett reason to get into the relational dynamics. She offers some great reflection on love and relationship.
The alternate title of this episode is "A Four Kleenex Movie" based on Dr. Barrett's rating scale for tear-jerker movies like this one.