Contact: Ron Keener, Editor, Church Executive, 800-541-2670 ext 204

MEDIA ADVISORY, Aug. 25 /Christian Newswire/ -- Just as "racial prejudice is a sin" was a truth claim that helped communicate the cause for ending slavery in the 1830s to 1860s, "the pro-life movement today has made its greatest gains when it has advanced this simple truth: 'That's a baby you're talking about,'" says Tim Stafford, author of a new book "Shaking the System: What I Learned from the Great American Reform Movements" (IVP Books).

Says Stafford: "It takes creativity to find the right way to encapsulate your truth claims in a way that communicates. I think that is a major reason why the campaign against same-sex marriage has seemed to be losing the broad middle ground of American society--it's truth claims are not easily expressed in a way that communicates to ordinary people."

An interview with Stafford appears as the current Web Exclusive article on the home page of Church Executive magazine (www.ChurchExecutive.com) and in the editorial for the September print and digital editions. Stafford was asked to comment on what the reform and social movements of a century ago and of the 1960s, when he briefly was an activist himself in the South, teach us on such issues as abortion and same-sex marriage.

Asked about the murder of George Tiller, the Kansas City doctor who performed late term abortions, Stafford said: "I don't know what specifically led to George Tiller's murder, but I do think that Christian activists sometimes forget that their words are heard not merely by thoughtful and careful people, but also by people who are mentally unstable.

"Activist movements attract such people, and I believe it is the responsibility of activist leadership to spell out what tactics they will embrace and what they will not. It's not enough to decry anti-abortion or anti-gay violence after it happens. I think we need to anticipate the possibility of unstable people doing the unthinkable, and spell out that there must be no violence, but only love," he says.

In his book Stafford writes that "antiabortion activists have learned that there is a fundamental unwillingness to hear the truth." Does truth win out, he was asked?

"No, truth doesn't necessarily succeed in winning over a majority. It never has. But when we try to communicate the truth, we succeed in sharpening the issues that every human being must face. It doesn't mean that they will do what is right."