- House of Stories - Thursday Jan.26 

Come and share, come and listen! 

Music, stories, 

images, poems, bring what moves you. 

Facilitated by

 Kevin Burke, SJ 

and 

Sara Postlethwaite, VDMF

Today is the Feast day of the conversion of Saint Paul. He became probably the fullest image of "conversion" for Christianity for the last 2000 years. However today, I remembered a story about Paul, that as so many of the Bible, has the capacity to completely puzzle me. Paul is visiting Troas and starts to encourage the people who live their faith there. However, the need of the people, (perhaps also partly his love to speak) inspired Paul so deeply that he talked on deep into the night. A young man called Eutychus fell asleep on the window sill. We can not be sure if he was bored or exhausted but that he feel asleep is well testified. Something, one generally doesn't want to be remembered by as a Church-goer. Not though for Eutychus. Millions know him only because Paul's preaching could not keep him awake but rather put him to sleep.   

A couple of things cause my attention. The author of the text really makes a point to mention that the upper room was lit brightly and abundantly (Eutychus did not fall asleep because it was too dark) And then Eutychus falls asleep twice. One might translate: 'Eutychus sitting on the window sill, was overcome by deep sleep; and as Paul kept on talking, Eutychus was overcome by sleep and fell down from the third floor, and was picked up dead.' It might be a rhetorical measure, to make sure that the reader really gets it, it might be that the writer her/himself was tired and started to repeat, or some copyeditor just made a mistake in one of the earliest version and now we are stuck with it.  

Can you imagine a parish that proclaims at it doors:  "Trouble sleeping? Come to my sermon. We preach like Paul."  However, as so many sacred stories could this story not reflect another kind of conversion? The bright light Paul saw, the touch he needed from Ananias, the profoundly blind-asleep he was towards Christ presence? Might it be reflected in the youth of Troas? Dying because they are bored out of their mind? Sitting in the amazingly bright lit room with captivating conversation not knowing how to see and understand what is of central importance for them and the generation after them? Might they fall even deeper asleep as more we talk? Is it the embrace, the touch they need as Paul needed it from Ananias to resuscitate? I don't try to explain the puzzle away. I just thought to ask some questions for reflection on this important day of Saint Paul's conversion. Whose preaching converted many and killed one and whose touch resuscitated one from darkness and left many clueless. 

Peace and blessing, Julia