=== an insistence on non-Christians accepting such teachings on blind faith
Please, you're speaking to a Catholic. Not some lobotomized Bibliolator or Enlightened.
I'll address the rest of your post later. You bring up some good points to which I'd like to respond when I have more time.
I have told you both (BE and CfromECUSA) that Catholicism, at least in the United States, is an over-intellectualized, urban, immigrant religion whose opinion for the most part of American Heartland culture is no different from that of our "Blue State" elites. I have never understood why Catholics were so prominent in a movement that supposedly celebrates the American Heartland when they have such a low opinion of its people.
I call your attention to Askel5's witty little mot about "lobotomized Bibliolator[s]." Now first of all, Catholics always react with the greatest offense when accused of "Mariolatry" or worhsip of statues. Yet many of them seem not to notice the irony in turning right around and branding their Fundamentalist Protestants with an "olotry." I ask you both in all seriousness: is the charge of "Bibliolatry" one whit more applicable than the common anti-Catholic charges? Yet Catholics who bristle at Fundamentalist insults feel absolutely no compunction about turning right around and doing the same thing.
I would point out another important thing: it is well known that American Heartlanders bristle at the hypocrisy of being labelled "stupid," "lazy," "white trash," etc., by people who make a career of defending Blacks and Hispanics from identical charges. May I ask why Catholics do not understand that similar charges of stupidity are equally hypocritical coming from members of a Church the majority of whose members throughout history have been illiterate peasants? Is it not at bottom a simple assertion of genetic cultural supremacy, ie, "our illiterate peasants are all honorary intellecutals but yours are objects of ridicule?" Just why should I resent this attitude one iota less than the same attitude when evinced by Blacks (for example)?
Every culture in the world is full of simple people. May I suggest that insulting those belonging to another culture while ignoring one's own is a form of ethnic bigotry?
And by the way, I notice that "lobotomized Bibliolators" don't have a plague of lisping, mincing, evolutionist, higher critical clergy and theologians cowering from liberalism while leading crusades against war and the death penalty. Considering the vast gulf in quality of leadership, I don't think any Catholic has any reason to snipe at "Bibliolators." Perhaps the Catholic Church would be better off if its clergy were less intellectual.