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A man of strength and wisdom, John Paul became an inspiration to generations of both Catholics and non-Catholics throughout the world by encouraging freedom, promoting peace and respecting all faiths.

In the annals of history, few men have left a more positive imprint on the world than Pope John Paul II.

Pope John Paul II brought hope to all corners of the world, to people of all faiths and backgrounds, with his powerful belief in the human spirit.

Faith in a holy cause is to a considerable extent a substitute for lost faith in ourselves.

But Paul, in his preaching of the Gospel, is a debtor to deliver the word not to Barbarians only, but also to Greeks, and not only to the unwise, who would easily agree with him, but also to the wise.

The great majority of the nobility and gentry of England clung to the doctrine and ceremonies of the ancient church, and yet were united in determination to oppose the papal claims.

Pope John Paul, a man of peace and compassion, was one of the most revered leaders of our time.

St. Pope John XXIII called for the Second Vatican Council because he understood, as no Holy Father had in a long time, religion spoke to and found its language and symbols - its entire sense of the sacramental nature of existence - in the imagination that reveals not just the penalties of living, but the wonder and awe of our existence.

The great achievement of the Catholic Church lay in harmonizing, civilizing the deepest impulses of ordinary, ignorant people.

On a scale personal enough to be felt by all, but big enough to be symbolic, the two irreconcilable faiths of our time - Communism and Freedom - came to grips in the persons of two conscious and resolute men.