The church didn't create Scripture; it simply recognized the divine imprint and authority Scripture already possessed because it was and is the very Word of God.
The Church has never claimed to have "created" Scripture. The Church, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, identified the canon as such. Man does not possess the natural ability to discern the will of God. Doing so would imply that man can reckon His essence. This is an impossibility. We cannot, of our own accord, fathom God. We are of a completely different nature, beholden to reason by use of the senses. God simply IS. Therefore, there is no possible way that - if it is agreed the Church identified the canon properly - anything without the assistance of the Holy Spirit could have established the Bible as we know it. Furthermore, if it is agreed that the Holy Spirit was present and accounted for during the process of determining the canon, it is more incredible to deduce that the Holy Spirit was not there from the beginning and, furthermore, not there at the time of the Reformation, nor today. If it can be agreed that Christ created a Church, then it is absolutely imperative to believe that He created it FULLY. The Protestant point of view seems to assert that the Church of antiquity was NOT created in fullness, not imbued with the guidance of the Holy Spirit and, therefore, subject to heinous error (pagan statues, cannibalism, Mariolotry). This cannot possibly be. By definition, anything lacking perfection is "evil". God cannot create anything evil. Therefore, either the Church built on Peter was imbued with Divine Wisdom, or it was not created by Christ at all. In which case, the concept of "church" is nothing but a human fabrication with no relation whatsoever to salvation history.
Now, one may argue that, yes, Christ created the Church, but the stewards betrayed Him, and thus, the Reformation. But this contradicts Christ's prayer in the Garden of Gethsemane "that they may be one, as we also are." Can the Father deny anything of the Son. Was Christ's will not conformed to the Father's? Impossible. Christ's will was not fracture. Not divorce. It was unity. To presume that Christ would at once provide the Holy Spirit to the Church in order to identify the canon, but arbitrarily remove His guidance is unthinkable. It's contrary to Christ's will. It would be an act of evil to divorce the bride from her spouse.
The less-than-perfect Supreme Court, though, has often arrogated to itself powers nowhere to be found in the text of the Constitution.
The Supreme Court is not guided by the Holy Spirit in interpreting the Constitution. This is not a relevant analogy.
Just because there are many interpretations competing in the Protestant marketplace of ideas does not mean that every one of those interpretations is false (or, conversely, that none of those interpretations is true).
So the Christ intended a Church that was sometimes right, sometimes wrong, depending on who's giving the sermon that day? The notion of "many interpretations" defies the simple nature of Truth. By what basis does a Protestant decide what is Truth, if the guarantor of truth - the Holy Spirit - is providing different answers to different sects? The idea collapses on itself. There is no way to verify anything as Truth, unless one denomination can prove it has the fullness of that truth. And the only way to effectively do that is to trace a line of Apostolic succession - the laying on of hands - back to Pentecost Sunday. Nowhere else can this be claimed, except by the Catholic Church.
What it does teach is that since God chose to reveal Himself by means of propositional revelation, He has given His people the means of understanding that revelation such that the true believer has no need of anyone else -- let alone a Magisterium or Pope on high -- to teach him.
This is patently absurd. At what point does one reach the level of "true believer"? Is there a directory of "true believers" who it can be proven understand revelation as God intends? If a true believer needs no one else, then Christ did not create a Church. The entire concept of "church" - a BODY of believers - becomes heretical.
they embrace transubstantiation and believe that at the sound of the bell, the substance of bread and wine turn into the physical body and blood of our Lord.
Another glaring error. The transubstantiation has nothing to do with the ringing of a bell. Transubstantiation occurs when the words "This is my body...this is my blood..." are spoken over the species of bread and wine. The ringing of the bell is merely to draw attention. How can someone critique the Catholic church and not even understand Her most solemn action?
While we may want to share the tingles of Neocatholics who relay their love at first sight, away in a manger, and twilight zone accounts,
The author does not demonstrate what he means by "twilight zone".
At this point, I'll stop. There are so many errors in this piece, it's almost too much to consider. As Fulton Sheen said, "People don't hate what the Catholic Church is; people hate what they BELIEVE the Catholic Church is."
This is patently absurd.
You bet it is! Part of the absurdity is that, if the "true believer" has no need of anyone else, because he gets his insights directly from the Holy Spirit, a fortiori he clearly has no need of anything else, either, so someone who says he has the Holy Spirit and doesn't need the Church, ought not to need the Bible, either.
And then there's the absurdity that this automatically contradicts sola scriptura, because if my "Spirit-led insights" are what guides me, then I'm adding something to the Bible, namely, my "Spirit-led insights".
But the root of the problem is right here:
At what point does one reach the level of "true believer"? Is there a directory of "true believers" who it can be proven understand revelation as God intends?
Every sola scriptura believer in the world thinks he knows at least one "true believer," and that's the person he sees in the mirror.