Pope John Paul II with Mother Teresa in 1986.

As Pope, John Paul II's most important role was to teach people about the Christian faith. John Paul wrote a number of important documents which many observers view as having a long-term impact on the Church and on the world.

A great achievement of John Paul II was the publication of the Catechism of the Catholic Church, which became an international best-seller because of its clarity of doctrine, an important solution together with his other writings, to the doctrinal confusion which happened during the Post-Vatican Crisis. This refers to the 1970s and 80s when hundreds of priests and nuns left the Catholic Church. John Paul II was able to turn around the decline in the 1990s.

His first encyclical letters focused on the Triune God; the very first was on Jesus Christ, the Redeemer ("Redemptor Hominis"). He maintained this focus on God throughout his pontificate. He saw his work as Pope as an implementor of the Second Vatican Council's teachings, an important centerpiece of which is universal call to holiness. This is the basis for his canonization of saints from all walks of life, as well as for establishing and supporting the personal prelature of Opus Dei, whose mission is to spread this call to laity.

John Paul II's Coat of Arms
The Letter M is for Mary, mother of Jesus

In his master plan for the the new millennium, the Apostolic Letter At the beginning of the new millennium, ("Novo Millennio Ineunte") a "program for all times", he emphasized the importance of "starting afresh from Christ": "No, we shall not be saved by a formula but by a Person." Thus, the first priority for the Church is holiness: "All Christian faithful...are called to the fullness of the Christian life." Christians, he writes, contradict this when they "settle for a life of mediocrity, marked by a minimalist ethic and a shallow mediocrity." The "training in holiness calls for a Christian life distinguished above all in the art of prayer." His last Encyclical is on the Holy Eucharist, which he says "contains the Church's entire spiritual wealth: Christ himself." Building on his master plan further, he emphasized the need to "rekindle amazement" on the Eucharist and to "contemplate the face of Christ".

In The Splendor of the Truth ("Veritatis Splendor"), a crucial papal encyclical on morality, he emphasized the dependence of man on God and his law ("Without the Creator, the creature disappears") and the "dependence of freedom on the truth." He warned that man "giving himself over to relativism and scepticism, goes off in search of an illusory freedom apart from truth itself."

Other important documents include The Gospel of Life ("Evangelium Vitae") and Faith and Reason ("Fides et Ratio").

John Paul II was also considered to have halted the progressive efforts of Vatican II, becoming a standard-bearer for the conservative side of the Catholic Church. He continued his staunch opposition of contraceptive methods, abortion and homosexuality.

A controversial point of the John Paul II papacy was his October 1, 1986 letter to all bishops that described homosexuality as a "tendency ordered toward an intrinsic moral evil" and "an objective disorder". His book Memory and Identity claimed that the push for homosexual marriage may be part of a "new ideology of evil ... which attempts to pit human rights against the family and against man."