I’m afraid that I might have been put at a disadvantage for this week’s discussion. When it comes to thoughts on the death and resurrection of Christ, my views are certainly going to be different from that of my brother Michael’s.

I’ve experienced Easter in a host of ways since my childhood. Of course, going to Church early in the morning and finding no parking spots in the lot was a common occurrence and so was going through the Stations of the Cross in Sunday school (with most of the gory bits censored).

I remember being scolded every time I would suggest Big Macs for dinner on Friday nights because for some reason or another Jesus being condemned to death meant that we became Hindu one night out of the week. On the bright side, since I gave up eating meat a few years ago, Fridays during Lent are the only time my father can’t poke fun at me for being a hippy vegetarian anymore.

In Catholic school, to edify us in the ways of the Paschal mystery, we got to spend a week in theology class watching Mel Gibson’s “The Passion of the Christ,” which, if nothing else, made me glad that I’m not a Roman criminal because death by crucifixion is a particularly nasty way to go.

I even went to Good Friday Mass one year. It’s not because I was feeling particularly pious; it was actually because a good friend of mine had used me as a cover to hang out with his girlfriend by promising her parents that I was with them the whole day, and since the two of them were planning on meeting her parents at Mass that evening, it would have looked suspicious had I not been with them (I forgive you for this one, Nick). So I missed out on the day at the Arboretum and instead got to go to the “fun” part that consisted of watching people have their feet washed and choking on incense as the altar boy circled the room with a procession of silent churchgoers behind him. Ironic that an occasion meant to celebrate the resurrection of a savior felt so much like an imperial death march.

And then of course there were all the Easter egg hunts, the chocolate bunnies and the festive springtime colors. Whether or not one could logically link the salvation of mankind to the story of Peter Cottontail always seemed beside the point as a youngster.

So what does Easter mean to me now? I guess it means the same thing that most other Christian holidays mean to me by this point.

It’s a nice excuse to see family members, a privilege that’s hard to come by as I get older. It’s a reminder that as one of few people not posting about how wonderful Jesus is on Facebook, that I’m sort of an anomaly among my group of friends. It’s sort of like at SMU dinners I’ve attended when the celebration and mingling is interrupted with a moment of silence and prayer and I don’t really know what to do with my hands.

It’s that simultaneous feeling of sheer isolation and unconditional and undeserved love that’s come to characterize my life for years, and I don’t think I’d have it any other way.

I know my thoughts won’t compare in profundity to Michael’s, but this is the best offering I can give.

Bub is a junior majoring in English, political science and history.