That phenomenon is not limited to the Catholic Church. Ultimately NOTHING happens that is not within the will of God, either by his permissive will or his perfect will. What is being bandied about on this thread is the idea that everything the Catholic Church ordains is the perfect will of God and it has the imprimatur of God stamped upon it. Priests are granted the authority of God because some other priest has granted it to him. God's will then is subject to the whims of men and somehow if a priest ordains something, then it can be said that God ordained it.
In a real sense what you have is not priestcraft, but witchcraft, where God is ordered around and made to assent to some priest's ritual ordination or command. God forgives sins because the priest forgives sins. God ordains a priest because a priest has ordained the priest. Bread becomes God because a Priest declares the bread to be God.
Is all this sillyness within the will of God. Yes, he permits us to follow our folly. But if we allow him to truly lead us, he will lead us away from folly and into his presence.
How long and why will it remain a mystery to many how a humble soul can hear of Jesus, whether from a Catholic Priest, a Baptist Minister, an Episcopalian Priest, or a Mormon Missionary and that humble soul open up and trust Jesus to be Savior? It happens because of The Holy Spirit, not because of the traditions promoted by men. Traditions tend to reduce the opening of the door to the heart rather than open it wider, when the soul is first seeking The Truth to lead him/her. Perhaps that's why I like the term 'faither' instead of believer, because a faither is one in action, whereas believer is all too passive in nature, prone to doubt and reserved of action transformation of self by the Holy Spirit's influence.
What was the Church in 1400, 1300, 1200... 33 A.D.? Was it all witchcraft?
The Church from the beginning had hierarchy and succession. For example St. Irenaeus (d.202) in his Against Heresies wrote: “Those that wish to discern the truth may observe the apostolic tradition made manifest in every church throughout the world. We can enumerate those who were appointed bishops in the churches by the apostles, and their successors down to our own day, who never taught, and never knew, absurdities such as these men produce. For if the apostles had known hidden mysteries which they taught the perfect in private and in secret they would rather have committed them to those to whom the entrusted the churches. For they wished those men to be perfect and unblamable whom they left and their successors and to whom they handed over their office of authority....”
And what about the presence of Christ in the Eucharist? Did the Christian faithful have it wrong until Calvin, Luther, and company? St. Ignatius of Antioch (died for Christ in 110 A.D.) wrote of those who deny the real presence of Christ in the Eucharist: "Let us stand aloof from such heretics. They abstain from the Eucharist and from prayer, because they confess not the Eucharist to be the flesh of our Saviour Jesus Christ, which suffered for our sins, and which the Father, of His goodness, raised up again."
That is the constant testimony of the one, holy, catholic and apostolic Church whose Creed has remained the same since the time of the Apostles.