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2Ti 3:16 All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness

But you shouldn't take my word for it. The church fathers separated what was inspired from what was not. They called it the Bible. Now, many centuries later they're saying, "Hey, there's more..."

Issue 2 - Rejecting the Catholic Church because of the Priestly scandals.

Has nothing to do whether the Church of Rome is doctrinally correct.

Meaningless. Asking me to get a "good overview for the Scriptural basis" by directing me to Catholic material is like me asking you to read Reformed material. (BTW-I frequently read Catholic material with an open mind. I doubt if many Catholics read Reformed material.)

Issue 4 - The Catholic Church teaches the worship of Mary. No, it does not. It is a complete misperception and misunderstanding. When you see people kneeling before a statue

Exo 20:4-5 "You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth. You shall not bow down to them or serve them, for I the LORD your God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and the fourth generation of those who hate me,

However Catholics like to try to justify themselves on this point, they are in clear violation of one of the top ten of God's commandments.

Issue 5 - The Catholic Church teaches the worship of statues, icons, and paintings.

Please explain the term venerating. It's not any different than worshipping.

Issue 6 - The Catholic Church advocates and employs meaningless repetitious prayers. No, it does not. Catholics pray both

Do you mean, "Hail Mary, full of grace...."?

And how many bible studies do they allow? How many commentaries do they have? You'll find that there aren't a whole lot.

Issue 8 - Instead of building large, beautiful, ornate Cathedrals and Churches, Catholics should use that money for the poor.

Nothing wrong with having a nice building. Something is wrong when you have beautiful mable bathrooms with gold fixtures.

Issue 9 - Do Catholics teach and believe that they can save themselves, or that salvation comes from God alone? The Catholic Church teaches that salvation comes from God alone. ... However,

Well, you started out well.

Never heard this. However, are you saying the the ONLY church is the Catholic Church and you can be saved ONLY through the Catholic Church?

There are a couple things in your post I wanted to respond to, because I used to see some of these issues in a similar way to the way you see them. (I hope they don't run me right out of here on a rail because of the length of this reply to your own lengthy post.) :-)

Here goes.

Issue 1 - Bible only? Where in the Bible does it specifically say that someone was instructed or inspired by God to write the "Gospel of Matthew"? (Please give me the actual Bible book, chapter, and verse where it explicitly says that.)

2Ti 3:16 All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness

Thanks for illustrating exactly what I was talking about.    The words "Gospel of Matthew" are not found anywhere in the text you provided.    In fact, there is no text to be found anywhere in the Bible which says that the "Book of Matthew" belongs in the Bible, or the "Book of Mark" belongs in the Bible, or that says that any other Book or writing that is in the Bible belongs in the Bible. There was no "Table of Contents", or list of books to include, provided within any of the original Bible sources themselves.

In other words, there were no instructions inside the Bible itself that spelled out exactly which books or writings actually belong in the Bible.    That was decided by "Holy Tradition" -- Church Councils -- human beings, under the infallible guidance of the Holy Spirit, who met and discussed which books/writings should be included in the Bible, then acted upon those discussions, defining exactly which books should be made part of the Bible.

If you are a believer in the Bible, you HAVE to rely on Holy Tradition, involving those human beings in those early Church Councils who decided which writings were going to be included in the Bible.    (You don't have any other choice -- that is exactly what happened.)    That was my point in my post -- you can't truly be a Bible-only Christian -- you have to rely on other sources, such as the Church Councils which defined precisely which writings were to be included in the Canon of Holy Scriptures.    Those Church Councils and their decisions about which writings were to be considered part of the Scriptures are NOT discussed in the Bible, anywhere. They came ONLY through Holy Tradition in those early Church Councils.

(By the way, Paul's second letter to Timothy could not have been referring to the New Testament, as the New Testament was not even finished being written yet, let alone compiled into the final form of the New Testament yet. That Epistle (2 Timothy), which Paul was still writing there in that text you quoted, is itself actually part of that New Testament, and was selected to be included in the Bible by those Church Councils).

Issue 3 - The Biblical Basis for the Catholic teaching concerning the Real Presence in the Holy Eucharist. Many Scriptural passages affirm the Catholic teaching about the Holy Eucharist, including "John 6", "1 Corinthians 11", and many others. To get a good overview for the Scriptural basis for this teaching about the Eucharist of the Catholic Church (and the Orthodox Church), I would recommend a good small book

Meaningless. Asking me to get a "good overview for the Scriptural basis" by directing me to Catholic material is like me asking you to read Reformed material. (BTW-I frequently read Catholic material with an open mind. I doubt if many Catholics read Reformed material.)

So, using that logic, since the entire New Testament was written by Pro-Christian Christians, it is "meaningless", and you cannot possibly accept any of it, since there are no opposing writings from anti-Christians included in there?

I think you should trust a little more in Jesus Christ who solemnly promised that when he built his Church, the gates of hell would not prevail against it. He meant it, and he didn't lie.

(Plus, two of those four books I mentioned in that particular issue were actually written by former Protestants, one of whom (Scott Hahn) used to be a highly respected Protestant (Presbyterian) Pastor, with a strongly "reformed" background.)

Issue 4 - The Catholic Church teaches the worship of Mary. No, it does not. It is a complete misperception and misunderstanding. When you see people kneeling before a statue

Exo 20:4-5 "You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth. You shall not bow down to them or serve them, for I the LORD your God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and the fourth generation of those who hate me,

However Catholics like to try to justify themselves on this point, they are in clear violation of one of the top ten of God's commandments.

So, five chapters later in Exodus, when God commands them to make some graven images of angels, you think he is violating that earlier commandment he made, as you understand it?

Exodus 25:18-19 --- And you shall make two cherubim of gold; of hammered work shall you make them, on the two ends of the mercy seat. Make one cherub on the one end, and one cherub on the other end; of one piece with the mercy seat shall you make the cherubim on its two ends.

Then, in the next chapter...

Exodus 26:1 --- "Moreover you shall make the tabernacle with ten curtains of fine twined linen and blue and purple and scarlet stuff; with cherubim skillfully worked shall you make them.

What God was talking about in the Ten Commandments was idolatry -- the making and worship of images as idols of "other gods", not artistic spiritual images (non-idols), such as the angels mentioned just a few chapters later (spiritual images), which were (obviously) perfectly permissible with God, as he actually ordered that they be made.

Perhaps one could mistakenly think that God (or his Bible) was somehow confused about this issue between these two texts in the book of Exodus, or, more likely, one might think that you just may be misinterpreting one or both of those commands from God. Now, when assessing whether God was confused, or whether you are misinterpreting that commandment and the Bible, I'll go with the latter every single time. (You should too - God is not confused.)

Issue 5 - The Catholic Church teaches the worship of statues, icons, and paintings.

Please explain the term venerating. It's not any different than worshipping.

Veneration means "giving honor", like the commandment says to give to your parents. Worship is what you give God alone. They ARE completely different. (You don't worship your parents, do you?)

Issue 6 - The Catholic Church advocates and employs meaningless repetitious prayers. No, it does not. Catholics pray both

Do you mean, "Hail Mary, full of grace...."?

Yes, since that was one of the prayers I specifically mentioned in that first post, that certainly WAS one of the prayers I was referring to. I told you back there in that post why considering that as "meaningless repetition" is bogus and false, generated by the father of all falsehoods.

Issue 7 - The Catholic Church does not place any or much emphasis at all on the Bible. While we could all certainly benefit from a lot more time spent with the written Word of God, I think it is pretty ludicrous to claim that Catholics ignore the Bible.

And how many bible studies do they allow? How many commentaries do they have? You'll find that there aren't a whole lot.

No, I will NOT find that there aren't a whole lot.    (There most certainly ARE a whole lot.)    Do a Google search on "Catholic Bible Commentaries", for example.)    And there is absolutely no limit to the number of Bible studies allowed in the Catholic Church.    They are going on all the time.    Several of the books in the list of books I included are Bible commentaries, written by highly esteemed Biblical experts/scholars, and actually there are a huge number of other Catholic ones available.    I would also urge you to check out EWTN some time.    They are always doing all kinds of Bible studies -- please check them out.

In addition, many of the books on the first list I provided were Bible Study related books.    (See especially books by Scott Hahn, Edward Sri, Tim Gray, Jeff Cavins, and Stephen Ray, for starters.)

Also, there are many Catholic Bible Commentaries available.    Here are just a couple examples:

Navarre Bible & Commentaries

Ignatius Catholic Study Bible: New Testament

The Great Adventure / Bible Timeline - Bible Study Series

Also, check out this web site for a lot of Catholic Bible resources:

Saint Joseph Communications

Issue 8 - Instead of building large, beautiful, ornate Cathedrals and Churches, Catholics should use that money for the poor.

Nothing wrong with having a nice building. Something is wrong when you have beautiful mable bathrooms with gold fixtures.

Got a Bible text for that assertion, or is that from gospel according to you?

Issue 9 - Do Catholics teach and believe that they can save themselves, or that salvation comes from God alone? The Catholic Church teaches that salvation comes from God alone. ... However, Well, you started out well.

Let me ask you something from a slightly different angle -- when God with his sovereign power and will chose to enter this world (Jesus), beginning the path that would lead to Calvary and our only hope for salvation, did he choose to do that without any human involvement (as he easily could have), or did he choose to involve a human being in that process, being born of a human woman named Mary? Was Mary involved in any way in giving birth to Our Savior, raising him, and helping him on HIS path to providing us our salvation, or is the Bible lying? Can you distinguish in your mind the concept that HE brought that salvation to us, but that he also chose to involve a human Mother on his path to that sacrifice? Are both of those things true, or not? If God himself chose in his sovereign power and will to involve a human Mother to bring Jesus to us, and eventually see him be crucified for our sins, are you denying that he chose to involve a human Mother in that path of Jesus to our salvation?

Issue 10 - The Biblical meaning of "Church", as used in Matthew 16:18, 1 Timothy 3:15, etc. Some people who have disagreed with the Catholic Church in the past have insisted that the Greek term looking roughly like "ekklesia" has been repeatedly mistranslated, and in "the Bible according to them",

Never heard this. However, are you saying the the ONLY church is the Catholic Church and you can be saved ONLY through the Catholic Church?

This issue was discussed in response to some people who were saying in a number of prior threads that the Greek word used in some of these passages could not possibly be translated as "church" (like it is in most of the English Bible tranlations in modern use), but had to be translated as "assembly". Many respected Biblical Greek-English Dictionaries do not truthfully bear out that assertion they made.