Honoring Star Trek’s 50th anniversary in September, the Vatican newspaper L’Osservatore Romano said the popular series gave the world a model of peace, tolerance and cooperation at a time of global tensions. • After a Polish immigrant was beaten to death by a teenage mob in Harlow, England, on Aug. 27, President Andrzej Duda of Poland wrote to Anglican and Catholic church leaders in the United Kingdom urging them to help to protect Polish migrants from xenophobic violence and abuse. •  Loyola University Maryland in Baltimore was the training home for five swimmers who represented the United States at the Paralympics in Rio de Janeiro, held from Sept. 7 to Sept. 18. • The Grammy winner and country-folk legend Emmylou Harris will be heading up a series of concerts this fall to benefit Jesuit Refugee Service’s Global Education Initiative. • The Democratic vice presidential hopeful Senator Tim Kaine said in a speech to the Human Rights Campaign on Sept. 10 that his support for same-sex marriage is driven in part by his Catholic faith and that he expects the church could change its views as he did.

This article appears in September 26 2016.