That of our Lord. The Church is Christ's bride (Ephesians 5:29) and has "no spot, wrinkle or blemish" (Ephesians 5:27). Christ also stated that the gates of Hell will not prevail against His Church (Matthew 16:18) so how can the Church commit error? Scripture is pretty straightforward about the Church's role in salvation, Its authority and Its organization. It's all a matter of deductive reasoning, correct interpretation and pure logic.
“Christ also stated that the gates of Hell will not prevail against His Church (Matthew 16:18) so how can the Church commit error?”
First, the gates of hell do not attack the Church. Gates were the weak point in city walls, most likely to fall under attack. Jesus is talking about the Church on offense, not defense. Further, there is a case for saying the ‘gates of hell’ represent death, and He is assuring them that death will not prevail against Him - the next verse is “21 From that time Jesus began to show his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things from the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and on the third day be raised.”
Either way, there is no promise that men will not be able to screw things up in a hierarchical church. We are told that we will have a mixture of good seed and bad growing, and it won’t be separated until the end. Think about Popes who have been condemned, or when there were 2 Popes, and get back with me on how infallible the Catholic Church is promised to be!
In any case, a church that can invent Purgatory & Indulgences can invent ANYTHING. My guess is that there will be open homosexual Catholic priests within the next 100 years, given the example of other hierarchical churches (Episcopal and Anglican). And why not? After all, the NT doesn’t have ANY priests, gay or not. If you can invent priests, you can decide they need to be celibate, or gay, or whatever.
“Scripture is pretty straightforward about the Church’s role in salvation, Its authority and Its organization.”
Please show me the explicit teaching on Priests and Popes in Scripture.