"You know, you have to suffer if you want to win. Jesus had to die and resurrect. That's the kind of thing we expect from our players. You must be ready to suffer in order to win or earn us some victory. You must risk everything and sweat and fight or be knocked out," he said.

Certain religious behaviours, like praying, surround the Canadiens, Bauer pointed out.

"[Bauer] has really touched something deep in Quebec society, something that is so obvious nobody has taken the time to mention it," he said. "It really strikes something, and it's really fun too. Serious, but with some humour."

"We really want to see what everyone wants to say.… When you have a lot of people passionate about hockey, and not about religion, it's interesting to see people's reactions to the question," she said. "If they can make connections between religion and sport, it helps get people involved; there will be a lot of diversity."

The graduate course is open to students in all faculties and those in undergraduate programs. Bauer expects to see more than his usual 10 to 20 people in the class.

"It's a divine inspiration," Bauer said of the idea behind the theology course that begins in January 2009.

The arena is their temple, the players are their saviours, and those who worship them pray that the sacrifices made on the ice — of blood, sweat and tears — will lead them to glory.

Graduate course set to debate whether one of Quebec's biggest passions is a religion

COLOR ILLUSTRATION: ILLUSTRATION BY EDWARD SOREL Campbell (far right) hit Montreal's favorite son with a harsh penalty, igniting a Forum frenzy.

An instant after the slap, Orlando spun the fan aroundand socked him in the jaw, scattering teeth like jujubes. Therewere shouts, invective, a rumbling in the Forum. The tear gascame 30 seconds later.

Campbell not only ignored the mayor's advice but alsomade a diva's entrance at the Forum,

The Rocket's triumphswere the people's triumphs.

Smoke from a tear-gas canister haddriven thousands of hockey fans into the streets, sparking afour-hour rampage that yielded the requisite fires, shatteredwindows, looted stores, overturned cars and 137 arrests.

Loud Start To The Quiet Revolution MARCH 17 1955 The RIOT OVER ROCKET RICHARD

Here with only three games remaining in the season, 38 goals and 36 assists for 74 points, two points ahead of his teammate Geoffrion, the trophy was, finally within his grasp, yet Campbell would snatch it from him.

When asked to comment, he said, “I don’t remember what happened.”

Richard stayed overnight but left the next day to attend the hearing at the Sun Life Building.

When Campbell’s train arrived at Grand Central Station, he read The New York Times’ account of Richard’s fight with Laycoe and Thompson. The path was clear. He knew it would require severe action.

Richard had further marred their relationship with his criticism of the president’s ruling on a fight between his French-Canadian teammate Bernie Geoffrion and the Rangers’ Ron Murphy.

This time he would receive no sympathy from Clarence Campbell, the hard-nosed president of the NHL

Opponents slung ethnic slurs — frog, French pea soup, dirty French bastard —

Richard knew his temper meant trouble but felt defenseless against it. “When I’m hit, I get mad and I don’t know what I do,” he confided in one writer. “Before each game, I think about my temper and how I should control it, but as soon as I get on the ice I forget all that.”

By 1955, he had become one of the game’s most penalized players. During 18 seasons total, he was assessed 1,285 minutes in penalties.

In 1947, he broke his stick over the head of another Ranger, Bill Juzda. A month later, he clubbed the Maple Leafs’ Bill Ezinicki in the Stanley Cup finals.

every goal their guy scored was a victory for the little guy, a rebellion against a kind of colonial imperialism, a reordering of the social order that set things right … at least for a night.

“The Babe Ruth of hockey,” Wind wrote.

Le Rocket accelerated quickly on his skates and the left-handed right wing had a backhand as sharp as his forehand, but at times, it seemed he could determine the fate of a game simply by his will.

By 1955, Richard had scored more goals, 422, than anyone in the history of the NHL — 98 more than the next guy on the list.

The critics thought he was fragile.

He began training at the Montreal Technical School to get a certificate that would allow him to serve, but the war ended before he completed the four-year course.

You’ve never seen a hockey player like Maurice Richard. Not Crosby. Not Gretzky. Not Orr, Beliveau, Howe. None of them had the talent, the intensity, the will to take over a game like Richard. And none of them meant to their fans what le Rocket meant to Canadien fans.

The Garden crowd is angry. Boston police come to the locker room. They want to arrest Richard for assault, to throw him in jail for the night. Montreal coach Dick Irvin blocks the entry to the Canadiens’ dressing room.

Once the officials finally subdue Richard and Laycoe, the referee, Frank Udvari, sends Laycoe to the penalty box with a five-minute major for drawing blood. When Laycoe throws a bloody towel at him, he adds 10 minutes.

but nothing like this, nothing as determined and wild.

He swivels and drops Thompson to the ice with a right to the face.

Richard thinks Thompson, who once played for the Bruins himself, holds him so Laycoe can hit him.

He hits him with such force across the shoulders that his stick splinters.

Laycoe lunges at Richard. His stick blade clips the Rocket above the left ear and opens a gash. The blood stains his scalp.

Richard was further aggravated by the fact his team was losing 4-1.

But the hit lit the fuse of Richard’s infamous temper.

It’s March 13, 1955. The tension between the two rivals in the six-team NHL has been building inside the Boston Garden all night.

“No one can know when the anger of men, whipped indefinitely, becomes sculpted into political revenge. And more, it is not just a matter of hockey.”

After the riot, the NHL began to crack down on all-out brawls (especially carrying your stick into one), though it would take another 25 years for the changes to take effect with the institution of the third-man-in rule.

It went on most of the night with fears of a repeat a few hours later as it grew dark again — only quelled when Richard went on radio and TV, asking for calm. He would reluctantly take his punishment.

featuring overturned cars, smashed windows, a shot fired from somewhere and 137 arrests.

Garbage and various fruit rained down on the NHL boss, one man raced up and smeared a tomato on Campbell, and less than a minute later a homemade tear gas bomb went off.

But the fact was the Rocket was suspended for the final three games of the season plus the entire Stanley Cup playoffs.

Conspiracy theories now abound, especially one that says the "hearing" with the players involved a few days later was a sham because the decision had been made.

The president really worked for the six owners, five of whom wanted the book thrown at Richard for the Boston incident.

Campbell was already infuriated with the Montreal star

Either way, Maurice Richard was in trouble.

So far, pretty normal for those days. The rest will always be disputed.

leaving the Habs' star cut on the head after a high stick.

Hockey's greatest player at that time was Richard, who in 1945 became the first to score 50 goals in a season (in 50 games, no less).

The NHL was a provincial, parochial six-team affair in 1955, featuring barely over 100 players.

How Francophone players in the NHL, almost exclusively the property of the Montreal Canadiens, believed they were more harshly treated by league president Clarence Campbell — especially Richard — when it came time to dish out suspensions and fines.

Sticks were high, fists flew, blood often smeared the ice, and the owners thought this was all manly and a great way to sell tickets.

Maurice Richard said many times that, in order to understand the events leading up to the riot of March 17, 1955 that forever bears his name, it was crucial to know how violent the National Hockey League was in those days.

The Richard Riot: Going down swinging

"You are their slaves; that's what you are. You tend them, you clean them, you gather up their dung as the poor do the rich man's crumbs. It is you who must keep them alive by hard work, because the earth is miserly and the summer so short. That is the way of it, and there is no help, as you cannot get on without them; but for cattle there would be no living on the land. But even if you could ... even if you could ... still would you have other masters: the summer, beginning too late and ending too soon; the winter, eating up seven long months of the year and bringing in nothing; drought and rain which always come just at the wrong moment..."

THE INTERPRETER OF GOD

The usual prayer at an end, the mother whispered:—"Yet five Paters and five Aves for the souls of those who have suffered misfortune in the forest." And the voices again rose, this time more subdued, breaking sometimes to a sob.

Eutrope Gagnon

"The thousand Aves have been said," murmured Maria to herself, "but I have not yet asked for anything ... not in words." She had thought that perhaps it were not needful; that the Divinity might understand without hearing wishes shaped by lips—Mary above all ... Who had been a woman upon earth. But at the last her simple mind was taken with a doubt, and she tried to find speech for the favour she was seeking.

"You won't forget to put out the lamp?" "No, father."

Affected by these memories of the past, they also were thinking of the candles already lit, of the hymns soon to be raised in honour of the Saviour's birth.

But when it was evening and the tasks of the day were done, she could resume her seat by the window where the feeble light of the lamp did not invade the darkness, look forth upon the fields hidden beneath their icy cloak, take the rosary once more in her hands and throw her heart into the prayer.

On Christmas Eve the weather was cold but windless. The two men went out betimes in another effort to beat down the road, with no great hope of success; but long before they left, and indeed long before daylight, Maria began to recite her Aves. Awakening very early, she took her rosary from beneath the pillow and swiftly repeated the prayer, passing from the last word to the first without stopping, and counting, bead by bead.

ONE THOUSAND AVES

"There is a fine clump over here," said a voice. Maria's heart beat faster as she arose and went toward François Paradis who was kneeling behind the alders. Side by side they picked industriously for a time, then plunged farther into the woods, stepping over fallen trees, looking about them for the deep blue masses of the ripe berries.

The party ran its quiet course. An hour of cards, some talk with a visitor who bears news from the great world, these are still accounted happiness in the Province of Quebec.

His glance strayed contentedly over the meager smoke-filled interior and those who peopled it. In the circle of faces tanned by wind and sun, his was the brownest and most weather-beaten; his garments showed many rents, one side of the torn woollen jersey flapped upon his shoulder, moccasins replaced the long boots he had worn in the spring.

Fly, fly, get off my face, my nose is not a public place!

Surprenant'

Lorenzo

Every Monday morning they opened a sack of flour and we made ourselves a bucketful of pancakes

Saturday, the eve of Ste. Anne's day

Maria, with Telesphore and Alma Rose

Legare was wrestling with some new inert foe,

Tit'Bé

The pyramidal scaffolding was put in place above a large stump and lowered, the chains which were then attached to the root passed over a pulley, and the horse at the other end started away quickly, flinging himself against the traces and showering earth with his hoofs.

At noon Maria came out to the door-step and gave a long call to tell them that dinner was ready.

TAW

Edwige Legare and Esdras

In the Province of Quebec there is much uncertainty in the spelling and the use of names.

The married couple had given their first children, Esdras and Maria, fine, high-sounding, sonorous names; but they had apparently wearied of these solemnities, for the next two children never heard their real names pronounced; always had they been called by the affectionate diminutives of childhood, Da'Be and Tit'Bé.

The window was open and through it came the distant roaring of the falls. The first mosquitos, of the spring, attracted by the light, entered likewise and the slender music of their wings filled the house. Tit'Bé went and closed the window, then fell on his knees again beside the others.

Assuredly a handsome fellow; comely of body, revealing so much of supple strength; comely of face in well-cut feature and fearless eye

The women were alone in the house with Tit'Bé and the children, the father having gone for seed-grain to Honfleur whence he would only return on the morrow.

To the old it means so much of the pride of life as no one would deny them, the late revelation of unknown delights, an hour of idleness, a distant journey, a dainty or a purchase indulged in without anxious thought, the hundred and one things desirable that a competence assures.

"At their ease..." Truly to know what it means one must have toiled bitterly from dawn to dark with back and hands and feet, and the children of the soil are those who have best attained the knowledge

"Make land!" Rude phrase of the country, summing up in two words all the heartbreaking labour that transforms the incult woods, barren of sustenance, to smiling fields, ploughed and sown. Samuel Chapdelaine's eyes flamed with enthusiasm and determination as he spoke.

"The beasts have been in the stable since the end of October and the barn is just about empty," said mother Chapdelaine. "Unless spring comes soon I don't know what we are going to do."

Young Telesphore's depravities supplied this household with its only domestic tragedy. To satisfy her own mind and give him a proper conviction of besetting sin his mother had fashioned for herself a most involved kind of polytheism, had peopled the world with evil spirits and good who influenced him alternately to err or to repent.

Samuel Chapdelaine turned about. "We are the last to cross this year," said he. And he halted the horse to breathe before putting him at the hill.

J'irai la voir un jour, M'asseoir pres de son trone, Recevoir ma couronne Et regner a mon tour ...

"Everybody says that the ice will hold for a long time yet," replied his sister-in-law. "Better sleep here again to-night, and after supper the young folks from the village will drop in and spend the evening. It is only fair that Maria should have a little more amusement before you drag her off into your woods up there."

honouring the Sunday mass, sole festival of their lives,

"Don't play the fool, Jean. Your wife will never let you pay a dollar for such a pig as that."

I   PERIBONKA II   HOME IN THE CLEARING III   FRANCOIS PASSES BY IV   WILD LAND V   THE VOWS VI   THE STUFF OF DREAMS VII   A MEAGER REAPING VIII   ENTRENCHED AGAINST WINTER IX   ONE THOUSAND AVES X   STRAYING TRACKS XI   THE INTERPRETER OF GOD XII   LOVE BEARING GIFTS XIII   LOVE BEARING CHAINS XIV   INTO THE DEEP SILENCE XV   THAT WE PERISH NOT XVI   PLEDGED TO THE RACE

The first puffs brought talk of the weather, the coming spring, the state of the ice on Lake St. John and the rivers, of their several doings and the parish gossip; after the manner of men who, living far apart on the worst of roads, see one another but once a week.

A moment earlier it had seemed quite deserted, this church set by the roadside on the high bank of the Peribonka, whose icy snow-covered surface was like a winding strip of plain. The snow lay deep upon road and fields, for the April sun was powerless to send warmth through the gray clouds, and the heavy spring rains were yet to come. This chill and universal white, the humbleness of the wooden church and the wooden houses scattered along the road, the gloomy forest edging so close that it seemed to threaten, these all spoke of a harsh existence in a stern land.

hoc est nihil, neque expedit.

These good Christians were prisoners to the Iroquois, who were taking them into their country to be put to death

"The Iroquois came, to the number of twelve hundred men; took our village, and seized Father Breboauf and his companion; and set fire to all the huts. They proceeded to vent their rage on those two Fathers; for they took them both and stripped them entirely naked, and fastened each to a post. They tied both of their hands together. They tore the nails from their fingers. They beat them with a shower of blows from cudgels, on the shoulders, the loins, the belly, the legs, and the face,—there being no part of their body which did not endure this torment. " The savages told us further, that, although Father de Brebceuf was overwhelmed under the weight of these blows, he did not cease continually to speak of God, and to encourage all the new Christians who were captives like himself to suffer well, that they might die well, in order to go in company with him to Paradise. While the good Father was us encouraging these good people, a wretched Iron renegade,—who had remained a captive with he Iroquois, and whom Father de Brebœuf had formerly instructed and baptized,—hearing him speak Paradise and Holy Baptism, was irritated, and said [page 27] to him, " Echon," that is Father de Brebœuf's name in Huron, " thou sayest that Baptism and the sufferings of this life lead straight to Paradise; thou wilt go soon, for I am going to baptize thee, and to make thee suffer well, in order to go the sooner to thy Paradise." The barbarian, having said that, took a kettle full of boiling water, which he poured over his body three different times, in derision of Holy baptism. And, each time that he baptized him in this manner, the barbarian said to him, with bitter sarcasm, " Go to Heaven, for thou art well baptized." After that, they made him suffer several other torments. The 1st was to make hatchets red-hot, and to apply them to the loins and under the armpits. They made a collar of these red-hot hatchets, and put it on the neck of this good Father. This is the fashion in which I have seen the collar made for other prisoners: They make six hatchets red-hot, take a large withe of green wood, pass the 6 hatchets over the large end of the withe, take the two ends together, and then put it over the neck of the sufferer. I slave seen no torment which more moved me to compassion than that. For you see a man, bound naked to a post, who, having this collar on his neck, cannot tell what posture to take. For, if he lean forward, those above his shoulders weigh the more on him; if he lean back, those on his stomach make him suffer the same torment; if he keep erect, without leaning to one side or other, the burning ratchets, applied equally on both sides, give him a trouble torture.

reduced to the last extremity, they were about to eat the flesh of one of their own number.

The long-delayed fleet finally arrives, August 23 and 24; it brings a new missionary, Charles Albanel. Another ship had, in March, left France for Canada; but, as it has not arrived, it is accounted lost; the Jesuits thus incur a loss of 4,000 livres.

on the pith, occurred the first execution by the hand of the hangman, in the case of a Creature of 15 or 16 years, a thief.

horrible torments inflicted upon the unfortunate Jesuits.

LXVIII. This is a letter by Buteux to the father general, dated at Three Rivers, September 21, 1649. In reply to a note from the latter, the missionary returns thanks for promised aid, which is especially needed at this time, when the French are continually harassed by Iroquois raids. The little settlement of Three Rivers is so slightly defended that the French are in daily peril of their lives; but all connected with the mission—not only the priests, but their servants—are ready to lay down their lives, if need be, for the sake of the little Indian church which they have there founded

If a Savage finds himself in your Cabin when you are eating, and if you present to him your dish, having scarcely touched anything, he will content himself with tasting it, and will hand it back to you. But, if you give him a dish for himself, he will not put his hand to it until he has shared it with his companions; and they content themselves usually with taking a spoonful of it.

Onditachiaé is renowned among the Tobacco Nation, like a Jupiter among the Heathens of former times, from having in hand the rains, the winds, and the thunder.

You might have seen this winter a great crowd returning from here to their Villages, having lost their moccasins [131] at a time [page 187] when there was nearly three feet of snow,—apparently as cheerful, nevertheless, as if they had wo

When the company is assembled, they sometimes begin to sing before [126] eating; sometimes, to have more courage, they eat first. If the feast is to last, as is often the case, the whole day, one portion of the kettles is emptied in the morning and the other is reserved for the evening.

If a Captain speaks one way and a dream another, the Captain might shout his head off in vain,—the dream is first obeyed.

The souls of those who died in war form a band by themselves; the others fear them, and do not permit their entry into their Village, any more than to the [100] souls of those who have killed themselves. As to the souls of thieves, they are quite welcome, and, if they were banished from them, there would not be a soul left; for as I have said, Huron and thief are one and the same thing; and the wealthiest man in the Country will do all he can to try his hand at it, if he finds something in your house lying apart which he likes.

. According to their story, it is Iouskeha who gives them the wheat they eat, it is he who makes it grow and brings it to [page 137] maturity. If they see their fields verdant in the Spring, if they reap good and abundant harvests, and if their Cabins are crammed with ears of corn, they owe it to Iouskeha.

Iouskeha

One the eighth of December, we celebrated with all [page 67] possible solemnity the Festival of the immaculate Conception of the Virgin, and each of us vowed to say a Mass every month in the year in honor of this same holy Mystery, with the other details your Reverenc

On the fourth of November, we set out to instruct this household, and to consider more exactly their [page 61] disposition towards the Faith

Beginnings are always hard, and then the causes of our troubles were extraordinary; and, moreover, I believe that my sins, which required that I should suffer these things, fell also upon the others;

In the beginning of the world, they say, the earth was dry

Aataentsic is often badly abused there.

you will gain nothing by asking all these questions, except that you will get this solution, which would not be bad, if their Religion were good, We do not know; we were told so; our Fathers never taught us any more about it.

the little animal that was now his sole companion

the Huron language shall be enriched

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the holy Ghost. Would you judge it fitting, while waiting a better expression, to substitute instead, In the name of our Father, and of his Son, and of their holy Ghost?

The sleep we get lying on our mats seems to us as sweet as if we were in a good bed

It was very fitting that, since they had become children of God on the day of the immaculate Conception of the holy Virgin, they should also begin on the day of her Purification to practice Christian duty,

This Prayer, among others, pleased them, inasmuch as we asked God to preserve them from pestilence, famine, and war.

Monsieur de Champlain and Monsieur the General du Plessis Bochart rendered us great service last year, by exhorting the Hurons in full council to embrace the Christian Religion

holding out a reward from me if she spoke properly;

As the women and children caused us much trouble,

the perfect health God gives us, and which he has given to all the French who have been in this country; for, they say, it is very strange that, except a single man who died here from natural causes, all the others, during the twenty-five years or thereabout in which the, French have been frequenting this region, have scarcely ever been sick.

HAPPY DEATH OF SOME HURONS

Island savage

Hurons are duly grateful.

attribute their failure to the cross erected by the missionaries.

total failure of the crops.

baptized eighty-six savages