Alright, I'm not going to discount your affection for the language, I apologise for my rude response.
"Take heed to yourselves, and to the whole flock, wherein the Holy Ghost hath placed you bishops, to rule the church of God, which he hath purchased with his own blood." (Acts 20:28)
So where's the authority to FORGIVE sin and confess sin to priest for forgivness in this? Where's the hierarcial structure imposed by the catholic church in scripture of TODAY?
It's quite a twist to take this verse as an example to set up a justification for a POPE! Bishops were equal to Apostles, not any other men of the church...This just adds a extra nonbiblical meaning to scripture that is not there.
Christ's conferral of this power upon his one, holy, Catholic, and apostolic Church, Mother and Teacher of all Christians, is certainly no sacrilege.
Please don't go there, I could just as easily say the Catholic church is the direct opposite of what Christ intended his church to be. And point to many scriptural references to back my argument.
Christ is the one with the power and ALL have to go to HIM and HIM alone for the forgiveness of sin, and to teach anything else is wrong.
Christ is the bridge, not the Pope.
Christ promised, in the person of Peter, the Church the power to forgive sins. The promise of this grant was repeated in St. Matthew 18:18 as addressed to the Church, and the power conferred by our Lord after his Resurrection upon the Apostles, as recorded in St. John 20.
The Apostles appointed priests and bishops who were to rule the Church after their departure. It follows that the power to forgive sins then is given by Christ to them, principally to the Bishops, the Successors of the Apostles, and in a derivative manner to the priests, their assistants, for Christ would not abandon his Church to which he said "I am with you for all days, even unto the consummation of the world." This argument is confirmed by the tradition of the Church, which has always reckoned that there is in her the power of forgiving sins.
The Catholic Church is, in substance and in virtue of her divine constitution, precisely what Christ intended his Church to be. We have his word for that: "I am with you always" and also "the gates of Hell will not prevail against it."
Those who acknowledge their sins in the tribunal of Penance, confessing them to a Catholic priest, certainly do bring their sins to Christ.