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The canons of both testaments were first stated at the so-called African councils in late 4c. There has been no dispute regarding the canon since then in the East and in the West the matter was taken up by Luther, which prompted the restatement of the African canons by Trent.

There were considerable discussions all along what is and what is not inspired. The opinions varied widely: some considered only a few books: gospel of Luke and some Pauline epistles as inspired; others would include letters of the early popes as well. The cirteria for canonicity were

• consistency with the Holy Tradition
• internal consistency
• consistency with books not in dispute
• clear apostolic provenance (Pope Clement, twice removed form St. Peter lacked that, or we'd have papacy spelled out in his letter to the Corinthians with great clarity; on the other hand, you are wrong in saying that Jude and James were not apostles)
• Jesus and His teaching as central topic (the Apocalypse was disputed on these grounds as lacking the historical concreteness of the rest of the scripture)

There were about 70 gospels to choose from. The manuscripts differed as well. The authorship is rarely spelled out in the books themselves, and was in dispute in many cases. The Church was the deciding factor in forming the New Testament Canon.

The Old Testament Canon was an easier matter thanks to the Jewish tradition; however, in an attempt to convict Christians of apostacy, the council of Jamnia (AD 90) removed books form the Septuagint and settled on the Masoretic Jewish Tradition instead, thus putting the Deuterocanonical books in doubt. That, too, was settled for the Christians in the African councils, till Luther decided to revive the controversy and eliminate books that did not fit his theological fantasies.

The books themselves were not written by baptist ministers either; all the human writers are saints of the Catholic Church.

For more, see

Canon of the Old Testament
Canon of the New Testament

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The canons of both testaments were first stated at the so-called African councils in late 4c.

Rome did not have a representative there and Jerome had already started the translation known as the Vulgate. Also, those meetings just reaffirmed what was already accepted. IOW, Rome did not really declare what they believed the Canon to be until after the fact.