Sexual morality
Pope Paul VI's 1968 encyclical Humanae Vitae banning artificial birth control opened a wide gulf between the church and many faithful. Many Catholics now engage in premarital sex, use contraception and get divorced at about the same level as Protestants and Jews, surveys show.
John Paul vigorously preached the virtues of premarital chastity and natural family planning but made little headway.
``He simply has not won people over on birth control,'' said Father Thomas Reese, editor of the US Jesuit magazine America.
The next pope will also face the growing acceptance in the West of homosexuals, whom the Vatican officially considers ``disordered'' and unfit for holy orders -- even though there are already many gays in the clergy.
Women and laity
The increasing equality between the sexes in developed countries has also led activists there to complain the Church has a stained-glass ceiling barring women priests.
John Paul has ruled out ordaining women completely and there is scant prospect of change in the coming decades or more. But a risk of their alienation from a male-dominated Church remains.
This is a key issue since mothers and teachers transmit the faith to young Catholics, among whom the Church hopes to find pious young men ready to become priests. If women become anticlerical, Reese remarked, ``then we're in real trouble.''
As priests become rarer, lay people have taken over more and more parish tasks. Traditionalists dislike the trend and have tried to reassert the priest's predominant role.
Collegiality
``Collegiality,'' shorthand for devolving decision-making from the Vatican to bishops around the world, became a recurring theme during John Paul's centralized papacy.
Vatican II reforms aimed to involve local bishops more in church decisions, but John Paul went back on several of them. He also barred several liberal theologians from
teaching.
A recent draft document showed that Vatican traditionalists also wanted to rein in other innovations such as altar girls and dancing and applauding in church. The proposal baffled and upset many churchgoers and looks likely to be watered down considerably if it is eventually published.
Religious tolerance
John Paul has arguably been the pope most open to other religions, but his doctrinal advisers have issued statements that other Christians say show a ``Catholic superiority complex'' contradicting his actions.
Relations with Muslims will be a major issue for the next pope, French Cardinal Paul Poupard, head of the Vatican's Council for Culture, said.
``I think it's the big challenge today ... this is crucial for the future.''
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