The Catholic Church certainly does consider the Scriptures to be infallible, God-inspired, error free Holy Scriptures and Catholics do uphold those. Mark did not say that the Scriptures contradict each other, only that they apparently do. It is up to us to rationalize their unified and comprehensive meaning.
Some believe that God chose these apparently contradictory passages to illustrate that we cannot rely upon the entire Bible in its unified context, not individual versus and snippets. Since none of us are clever enough to learn this by ourselves, we Catholics call upon the Magisterium to decide.
If this isn't the cherry on the heretic sundae, I don't know what is.
"ALL SCRIPTURE IS GIVEN BY INSPIRATION OF GOD, AND IS PROFITABLE FOR DOCTRINE, FOR REPROOF, FOR CORRECTION, FOR INSTRUCTION IN RIGHTEOUSNESS, THAT THE MAN OF GOD MAY BE PERFECT, THROUGHLY FURNISHED UNTO ALL GOOD WORKS."
What is WRONG with you people? Do you think God is playing some GOTCHA game with mankind? And that He sent secret decoder rings to some fallible group of men to teach other fallible men HIS TRUTH???
Excuse me? If they claim Scripture is error-free and infallible, then how can you or Mark or anyone else legitimately say they "contradict" each other? That is not what error free means, does it? You say perhaps God made it look like they are unreliable to make us "rationalize" them so that they will be "unified" and have a "comprehensive" meaning? Just what is THAT supposed to mean? God plays games with his Holy word? How about God's word - as he gave it to us - is his infallible word and we can trust in its authority and reliability because he GAVE it to us as THE authority for our faith? The way you guys make it sound it is a messy, coded mystery that only "special" people get to unlock its true meaning. How about, the word of God is spiritually discerned and understood and is not for idle curiosity seekers? Those who do not have the Holy Spirit, see foolishness instead of truth. Maybe THAT is the problem here?
II Peter 3:16 He (Paul)writes the same way in all his letters, speaking in them of these matters. His letters contain some things that are hard to understand, which ignorant and unstable people distort, as they do the other Scriptures, to their own destruction.
Some believe that God chose these apparently contradictory passages to illustrate that we cannot rely upon the entire Bible in its unified context, not individual versus and snippets. Since none of us are clever enough to learn this by ourselves, we Catholics call upon the Magisterium to decide.
That's just it, we CAN rely on the revealed word of God as long as we see it through our spiritual eyes and understanding through the Holy Spirit's illumination. You say you are not clever enough to learn the Bible's truths? It doesn't take cleverness or human brilliance, in fact:
I Corinthians 2:14 The person without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God but considers them foolishness, and cannot understand them because they are discerned only through the Spirit.
Your "leaders" have done a good job over the years convincing you that you can't really believe what you read in the Bible, that you NEED them to tell you what God meant to say. When you read a verse that seems to contradict what you have been taught, you go to your priest and tell him, and he sits you down and tries to "interpret" the clear meaning by twisting and distorting it to fit the party line. Then by the time he is done, you're not even sure you can ever read any of it by yourself. Is that how God meant us to "study"???
And if God breathed Scripture is not reliable enough on its own to be true to itself and able to be interpreted, what on earth makes anyone think that some random group of men claiming to speak for God is?
What are their credentials? I don't ever recall Jesus saying that He'd sent a magesterium to interpret Scripture for us, nor do I see anywhere in the Gospels where He gave instructions for said magisterium.
On the contrary, what He DID promise us was.....
John 16:13-14 13When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth, for he will not speak on his own authority, but whatever he hears he will speak, and he will declare to you the things that are to come. 14He will glorify me, for he will take what is mine and declare it to you.