The following comes from a March 31 LifeSiteNews article by Lisa Bourne:

An annual pro-life outreach at Cal State Long Beach drew the anticipated pushback this year, but one pro-life student has a more personal investment than most, and he’s prepared to continue making a difference in defense of life.

Jose Espinoza’s initial involvement in the Genocide Awareness Project at California State University, Long Beach (CSULB) got kicked up a notch a few years back after an encounter with a pro-abortion female student who told him to his face she would have aborted him.

Espinoza, who is blind, had asked the young woman her thoughts on aborting a disabled child, and she said she was fine with it.

“That took me back as a person with disabilities,” he told LifeSiteNews. “She told me if I was her child, and she knew I had a disability, she would make the choice to have an abortion.”

“It pretty much blew me away,” he said. “I just told her, how can you just think of aborting your baby just because of having a disability? You don’t know if that baby is going to grow up and be an inspiration for other people with disabilities.”

“I let her know that I didn’t understand why she would say that statement,” he added.

Espinoza is also a non-traditional student in his late 30’s. Born in Mexico in 1979, his family emigrated to the U.S. when he was a year old. The oldest of four, he was born with glaucoma and was essentially nearsighted until completely losing his sight at 17.

Espinoza spent 10 years in Disabled Students Programs and Services at Rio Hondo College in Whittier, eventually transferring to Cal State Long Beach this year after completing some general education courses at the community college.

This was his fifth year volunteering for the Genocide Awareness Project at CSULB after having done so while still studying at Rio Hondo. It was through a newsletter from the University’s Catholic Newman Club that he became familiar with GAP.

The Genocide Awareness Project (GAP) is a mobile exhibit displaying images of aborted fetuses and embryos alongside images of victims of other varied genocides.

Espinoza said he talks to students and tries to make them understand the history of [Planned Parenthood] and how it’s founder Margaret Sanger was focused on eugenics.

He estimates about 50-60 percent of college students will have reasonable dialogue, and maybe 10-20 percent are “so hardheaded, they refuse to be open about the issue.”

Even though he didn’t change the feminist’s mind that told him she would have aborted him, he feels the interaction was still good. “I would say I opened her eyes to the fact there are other options.”

He is confident his generation will see and be the change back toward a respect for the sanctity of human life.

And that confidence comes from his faith, because as Espinoza said, “I’m just doing what my Catholic faith wants me to do.”