returned to school to complete his education after having held several positions within the government of Tabasco and the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI). In 1987, he received a degree in political science and public administration after the presentation of his thesis, Proceso de formación del Estado Nacional en México 1821-1867 (Formation Process of the National State in Mexico 1821–1867). He lived in the Casa del Estudiante Tabasco during his college years on Violeta street in the Guerrero neighborhood of Mexico City. The institution was financed by the administration of Tabasco governor Mario Trujillo García, through efforts of the poet Carlos Pellicer, with whom López Obrador began discussing. There was empathy between the two because the young man raised his concern for the Chontal Maya. After the meeting, the poet invited him to his senate campaign during the 1976 elections. His university professor, Enrique González Pedrero, was another figure that influenced López Obrador's political trajectory. Family and personal life After attending school from 1973 to 1976, he returned to his native Tabasco where he held various government positions as well as being a professor at the Juárez Autonomous University of Tabasco. During his stint, he met Rocío Beltrán Medina, a sociology student, who suggested López Obrador embrace the progressive wing of the PRI. They eventually married on 8 April 1978. They had three sons: José Ramón López Beltrán (born 1981), Andrés Manuel López Beltrán (born 1986), and Gonzalo Alfonso López Beltrán (born 1991). Beltrán Medina died on 12 January 2003 due to respiratory arrest caused by lupus, which she had suffered for several years. On 16 October 2006, he married Beatriz Gutiérrez Müller, who had worked in the Mexico City government during his tenure as Head of Government of Mexico City. Together they have one son, Jesús Ernesto. During his first presidential run, some news reports identified López Obrador as a Protestant; in a television interview, he self-identified as a Roman Catholic. In March 2018, he declared, "When I am asked what religion I adhere to, I say that I am a Christian, in the broadest sense of the word, because Christ is love and justice is love." López Obrador has held a variety of nicknames throughout his life, including El Molido, El Americano (The American), La Piedra (The Rock), El Comandante (The Commander), and the most popular among them is El Peje, named after the common Tabasco fish, the pejelagarto.