In the News

• Pope Francis presided over the weddings of 20 couples, all from the Rome area, in St. Peter's Basilica in Vatican City, saying families are the "bricks that build society."

• Kaitlyn Turi, a spokesman for Six Flags Great Adventure in Jackson Township, N.J., said a power failure at the amusement park left some patrons briefly stuck on rides but that no injuries were reported.

• Queen Elizabeth II urged Scots to "think very carefully about the future" but didn't indicate a preference on how they should vote in the Scottish independence referendum this week.

• Keith Halpern, the lawyer for Erika Murray, 31, a Massachusetts woman arrested after the bodies of three infants were found in her home, said he's optimistic that forensic testing will show the babies weren't born alive and therefore weren't harmed or killed by his client.

• Stephanie Rawlings-Blake, the mayor of Baltimore, was taken to a hospital for tests after she complained of shortness of breath and chest pains during the city's "Star-Spangled Banner" celebration, later announcing that she had bronchitis and a respiratory infection.

• Haider al-Abadi, the new prime minister of Iraq, renounced his British citizenship and surrendered his passport, in accordance with Iraqi law, after his government was officially approved by parliament.

• Mary Kate Smith, 17, a junior from Ellisville, Miss., will be crowned South Jones High School's homecoming queen before she changes into a football jersey, pads and helmet to play as a kicker for the football team.

• Bill Dunfee, a pastor in Coshocton, Ohio, and strip club owner Thomas George were sent letters signed by the city law director, the county prosecutor and the sheriff asking them to stop weekly protests of each other's establishments over a years-long feud.

• Lois Bloedjes was one of hundreds of young Dutch men and women who pelted each other with overripe tomatoes in Amsterdam's central Dam square in an event organized as a protest against Russian sanctions blocking imports of European fresh produce.

• Karolyn Verville, the head of Sunshine Haven Animal Rescue & Wildlife Rehabilitation in Riverside, Calif., said experts at her facility are working to keep alive two baby opossums, whose mother was apparently beaten to death with a sharp rock, until the babies are old enough to be released into the wild.

A Section on 09/15/2014

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