Cut

The Baltimore Ravens cut Ray Rice on Sept. 8 after a video surfaced showing the running back beating unconscious his then-fiancée Janay Palmer in a casino elevator. In July the team suspended Rice for two games for the incident, but the sensational video pushed the team to release him and the NFL to suspend him indefinitely. Palmer married Rice after the incident in the elevator and now calls the public attention and her husband’s suspension a “nightmare.”

Died

Truett Cathy, 93, a small-business man who built a restaurant empire based on Christian principles, died on Sept. 8 in Atlanta. Cathy, a Southern Baptist, invented the fast-food chicken sandwich in 1961 and began serving it at his Atlanta restaurant, the Dwarf House. In 1967 he founded Chick-fil-A, a company that has expanded to 1,800 restaurants—all of which remain closed on Sundays. Cathy left the business in the hands of his children, who could sell it but are prohibited from making it a public company.

Marooned

Since lawmakers can’t get along in Washington, two U.S. senators decided to try it on a deserted island. Sens. Martin Heinrich, D-N.M., and Jeff Flake, R-Ariz., spent a week of their August recess marooned on a remote island for a new reality show called Rival Survival. Discovery Channel says Eru, part of the Marshall Islands, is “an utterly unforgiving deserted destination where the reefs alone are fraught with dangers that include venomous stonefish, lionfish, and scorpion fish.” The show is scheduled to air Oct. 29.

Awarded

Lawmakers on Sept. 11 awarded a posthumous Congressional Gold Medal to the victims of Flight 93 during a ceremony in Shanksville, Pa., on the 13th anniversary of the crash. Former House Speaker Dennis Hastert donated the flag that flew atop the Capitol on Sept. 11, 2001, noting it likely wouldn’t exist if Flight 93 passengers and crew hadn’t kept the plane from coming to Washington, D.C. The National Park Service is expanding the Flight 93 memorial to include a visitors center and learning center—scheduled to open in 2015.

Apologized

James MacDonald, author and senior pastor of the Chicago-area megachurch Harvest Bible Chapel, said he and his elder board were sorry for harshly disciplining three former elders last year. Harvest had censured the men in an online video after they raised concerns with MacDonald’s leadership. (See “Growing pains,” Nov. 2, 2013.) “We made statements about their character and actions that were hurtful and proved to be untrue,” MacDonald said, adding he and the elder board had asked for forgiveness and were rescinding the disciplinary action.

Returned

After a 2,446-day absence, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton stepped back into Iowa on Sept. 14. Clinton appeared with her husband, former President Bill Clinton, at retiring Sen. Tom Harkin’s 37th annual steak fry in support of Bruce Braley—the Democrat trying to replace Harkin. Clinton hadn’t been to Iowa, the nation’s first primary state, since then-Sen. Barack Obama defeated her there in the 2008 primary, sparking a long battle for the Democratic nomination. Clinton said she’s “thinking about” a 2016 run for president.