The Early Church had a strong hierachy from the bishop down. It did not have a strong papacy, but the See of Rome always had primacy. Papacy got stronger over time, especially in the politically fractured early medieval West. There is no contradiction.
The Pope was on the scene well before the Protestant Reformation. That didn't stop us heretics from leaving
Before the Reformed heresies there were sundry christological heresies, Gnosticism and Arianism chief among them. The papacy preserved the deposit of faith in that environment, and it preserved it against the Reformers centuries later, and thank God for that. It was never the intention of any pope to prevent anyone from leaving, then or now.
And the evidence for this is where???? It certainly is not in scripture nor in the history of the early church.
The Papacy got stronger over time until the Pope declared himself infalible just as Mary got stronger over time until she was declared immaculate. All this was after we left. Sorry, but from where I'm seated the heresy isn't on this side of the Tiber.