Bauer, who is from Switzerland, has lived in France, French Polynesia and Washington, and said discovering sport has been a way to discover society

"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.

"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."

In addition to the class, Bauer has launched an essay contest asking the question, "Are the Montreal Canadiens a religion?

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.

It is one of those moments when you realize you are part of something special, that this spontaneous moment is taking on a life of its own, and one of those moments that remind you sports can mean so much more than a game. He is giving them one final memory here in the Forum. The crowd begins to chant, “Ree-char, Ree-char!”

“If they hadn’t pampered Maurice Richard, built him up as a hero until he felt he was bigger than hockey itself, this wouldn’t have happened.”

They pulled cabbies from their taxis and beat them. Twelve policemen and 25 civilians suffered injuries. The police arrested 62 marauders, though many more get away, of course. The damage estimates ran into the tens of thousands of dollars. By about 3 a.m., the mob had spent itself and emptied the streets.

Campbell declared a forfeit in the Red Wings’ favor, the league’s first-ever such ruling.

You may not agree with his judgment, but you can’t but admire the superb courage of Clarence Campbell, a man who faced death throughout World War II, to whom the heckling and the minor missiles and the torrents of verbal abuse ranging from stupid to obscene hurled his way bounced like thistle-down off one who had faced shells and shrapnel

Even before Campbell could sit, they began shouting insults and throwing objects his way

Lacking their leader, Richard, Montreal quickly fell behind 2-0

There are no women, only men, many of them young-to-late teens, 20s, angry.

The suspension seemed especially harsh because of its likely consequences.

During World War II, Campbell enlisted in the Canadian Forces, served in Europe and was promoted to the rank of lieutenant colonel. After the war, he helped prosecute Nazis for crimes against humanity

He perceived an ethnic dimension to the abuse he — and his French-Canadian teammates — endured.

Yet Richard had a dark side. His intensity sometimes provoked violence. His tantrums had become as legendary as his goals.

He is God,” Frank Selke Sr. once said bluntly.

Richard stood 5’10, 180 pounds, with the fists of a former boxer, but his most distinguishing physical feature was his eyes, dark, focused, under a heavy brow.

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

He broke his ankle and was able to play in only 16 games. The critics thought he was fragile.

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

Then Richard snatches a stick from the ice and swings it wildly at Laycoe. He cuts him below the eye.

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

Their teammates swarm about, clutching and shoving one another. Linesman Cliff Thompson grabs at Richard but he slips the official’s grip. Richard connects with an uppercut to Laycoe’s cheek.

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

And the Rocket, who always refused to align himself with a political party, would lead his teammates to five straight Stanley Cup victories until retiring in the spring of 1960 with 544 regular-season goals to his credit.

Les Habitants trailed 4-1 at this point as the home side had their minds on something else, and that didn't help matters either. 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

137 arrests

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

Laycoe's story had Thompson trying to wrestle both of them and, in order to get at the Bruins player, Richard smacked the official.

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)

How Richard himself, the Rocket, was so much a part of Quebec society that he transcended even organized religion. Red Storey, a former referee and long-time hockey commentator, once said of him that, in Quebec, "hockey was bigger than the Church, and Rocket Richard was bigger than the Pope." Roch Carrier perhaps explained it best in his famous book The Hockey Sweater.

more harshly treated

It's also crucial to accept that you cannot really comprehend the Richard Riot unless you lived through and knew

So I shall stay—shall. stay here after all!"

her heart was melting into tears.

She will die if that be God's pleasure

ills, and it said they were the proper thing, so he sent the money for a box, and he declares it is a good medicine.

It left her spirit empty and yearning;

March dragged through its melancholy days; cold winds drove the gray clouds back and forth across the sky, and swept the snow hither and thither

eek a kinder climate where you would find everything that makes for comfort, where you could go out for a walk in the winter-time without being in fear of death

Not exactly,

There was none of the slowness of the Canadian speech, nor of that indefinable accent found in no corner of France, which is only a peasant blend of the different pronunciations of former emigrants.

sinking knee-deep in snow

God had cause to send him to his death-him more than another. He was a fine fellow, hard-working, and I loved him well.

smoking pipes innumerable while the women-folk are busy with the evening meal

The autumn!

Flies and mosquitos rose in swarms from the cut hay, stinging and tormenting the workers; a blazing sun scorched their necks, and smarting sweat ran into their eyes; when evening came, such was the ache of backs continually bent, they could not straighten themselves without making wry faces.

Mosquitos swarmed and circled in the fervent afternoon heat.

larger patches, where one might sit on one's heels and fill a pail in an hour.

the blueberries

The five men worked on unceasingly, while from day to day the clearing extended its borders by a little

The Canadian spring had but known a few weeks of life when, by calendar, the summer was already come

molasses in which they soaked large pieces of bread

wages of twenty dollars a month

June suddenly brought veritable spring weather

bad-tempered and often half wild

The ice is going out,

How nice it would be to live in a country where there is hardly any winter, and where the earth makes provision for man and beast.

was their only neighbour

It was the Demon of gluttony who tempted me."

infant Jesus

A fine parish indeed, that would have suited me nicely; good level land as far as you can see, no rock cropping up and no bush, everywhere square-cornered fields with handsome straight fences and heavy soil. Only two hours' drive to the railway

But when the sleigh reached midstream, below the great fall, the horse had perforce to slacken pace by reason of the water which had overflowed the ice and wetted the snow. Very slowly they approached the shore; there remained only some thirty feet to be crossed when the ice began to go up and down under the horse's hoofs.

as a burnt-offering, the dearest thing I had in this world

infested

Our Lord often gave him to understand that he held us in his protection, and that the powers of hell might indeed become furious against us, but that they were not unchained.

could we ever abandon these two good Fathers, who for us have exposed their lives? The love which they have had for our salvation will be the cause of their death; there is no longer time for them to flee across the snows. Let us then die with them, and we shall go in company to Heaven."

Thus this village was taken, almost without striking a blow, there having been only ten Iroquois [35] killed. Part of the Hurons—men, women, and children—were massacred then and there; the others were made captives, and reserved for cruelties more terrible than death.

where the Savage Christians are increasing in number and in virtue beyond all our hopes

Your very humble and obedient servant in our Lord, Paul Ragueneau.

About the end of this same month, father Druillettes departed to winter with the Savages.

livres

livres' weight of Beaver, which was more than 26 thousand livres for them; one desfosses, a soldier, with his brother, who had been a year [page 59] among the Hurons, brought for their share 747 livres' weight, for which they were paid at 4 francs a livre, and the rest at 5 livres, 5 sols

two Days later, three Captive yroquois iced

hoc est nihil, neque expedit

MAY

suspected of theft and threatened with Justice, proved to be lost; it was believed that he went to drown him self.

One might take one's place at the lectern, turning it conveniently to be understood; and. at high Mass, a quarter-hour is sufficient after the Gospel

in twenty Villages, about thirty thousand souls.

but the fear of bad weather compelled them, as I have said, to postpone the ceremony until Monday

Now all these ceremonies do not always take place; as for those killed in war, they inter them, and the relatives make presents to their patrons

I have seen Savages in our Cabin speak with gusto of the flesh of an Iroquois, and praise its good qualities in the same terms as they would praise the flesh of a Deer or a Moose. This is certainly very cruel; but we hope, with the assistance of Heaven, that the knowledge of the true God will entirely banish from this Country such barbarity

the relatives of the dead man consider themselves obliged in honor to resent it, and raise a force to attack them

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 won.

We live on the shore of a great Lake, which affords as good fish as I have ever seen or eaten in France;

xpect death every hour

We shall receive you in a Hut, so mean that I have scarcely found in France one wretched enough to compare it with; that is how you will be lodged. Harassed and fatigued as you will be, we shall be able to give you nothing but a poor mat, or at most a skin, to serve you as a bed; and, besides, you will arrive at a season when miserable little insects that we call here Taouhac, and, in good French, pulces [fleas], will keep you awake almost all night, for in these countries they are incomparably more troublesome than in France; the dust of the Cabin nourishes them, the Savages bring them to us, [62] We get them in their houses; and this petty martyrdom, not to speak of Mosquitoes, Sandflies, and other like vermin, lasts usually not less than three or four months of the Summer.

If you are accidentally hurt, if you fall sick, do not expect from these Barbarians any assistance,

They desired nothing more than these two prayers

Purification

were put to death, his father asked him if, when he became Captain, he would also put them to death.

On the way we baptized two sick persons whom. we believe to be now in Heaven.

Summer here is a very inconvenient season for instructing the Savages. Their trading expeditions and the farms take every one away, men, women, and children—almost no one remains in the villages. I will tell you how we spent last Summer.

Besides, in our Catechizing and teaching of the Savages, he served as Interpreter, and has translated several things into the Huron language for us, wherein we admired the facility with which he understood our language, and comprehended and explained the most difficult mysteries. In short, he gives evidence that truly he has the fear of God before his eyes.

You see the inclination of the Hurons, and especially of the Nation of the Bear, to receive Christianity; and this will be greatly increased by the fact that we have already baptized many of their children. For they say, " We do not wish to be separated from our children, we desire to go to Heaven with them.

We gather together the men as often as we can; for their councils, their feasts, their games, and their dances do not permit us to have them here at any 'hour, nor every day. We pay especial attention to the Old Men, inasmuch as they are the ones who determine and decide all matters, and everything is ordered by their advice. [8] All come willingly to hear us; all, without exception, say they have a desire to go to Heaven and fear the fiery torments of hell.

have scarcely ever been sick.

boy, who had always been sick and much emaciated before Baptism, had been very well since then

BARBARISM

idle and wandering Savages

The second part of this Relation, is occupied by a minute account of "the beliefs, manners, and customs of the Hurons,"—their myths of Deity and creation; their notions regarding the nature of man's soul, and its condition after death; their worship of the sky, and of demons; their superstitions, and faith in dreams; their feasts and dances; their games, and the general habit of gambling. Then are described, at length, the tricks of medicine men; the national characteristics of the Huron tribes; their customs, both in peace and war; their councils and oratory; and, finally, their solemn feast of the dead,—at which ghastly ceremony, once in twelve years, the corpses of all who have died during that time receive a public and common burial.

the conversion, baptism, and happy death of some Hurons.