LOL! Alright, well I certainly do not call your pope antiChrist. I actually happen to like your pope and believe he is a good man of God. I wish him well.
It [Protestantism] removed several inspired books from circulation; it disregards and ridicules the Holy Tradition apart from its written component (only Augustine among the Fathers is treated as authority, but frequently misunderstood).
I don't know anything about any removal of books, but as to all of it, we are protesting! We have to disagree with you on some things. We put more faith in God's written word than in handed down traditions.
It disobeys the Church that Christ established and leads its adherents away from the sacraments of Eucharist and confession, and children are frequently deprived of baptism, all these being necessary for their salvation.
Protestantism disobeys the RCC, not the "Church that Christ established". We don't lead anyone away from taking the Lord's Supper and confessing one's sins. We encourage it. We just don't agree with you on their meaning. Who are these children who are being deprived of baptism in Protestant churches? I'm a Southern Baptist, I love baptism!
It denies the necessity of works, despite they expressly asked for by Christ (open the Gospel at random and within 5 min of reading you will find something that Christ asks you to do), ...
We deny the necessity of man-driven works. We say Jesus did the real work when He died on the cross. Of course we should obey God and do good in His sight. He promises us that we will, but not because of us, but because of His presence in us.
The fundamentals of Christian ethics condemn contraception, extramarital sex, adultery, divorce followed by remarriage, usury, voting on moral issues, abortion cloning and euthanasia, scientism, irreligious education, and I could probably go on. On these issues Protestant opposition has either crumbled or is crumbling, -- why?
What are you talking about??? Who is crumbling on any of these things (except one)? Evangelical Protestants are on the front lines in political debate on many of these issues. Who was it that got rid of Harriet Meiers? It was us! Now, with God's grace we will have another vote against Roe. We are out there and we are working hard. You can't deny that. Catholics are working hard too, but you have no monopoly. The only exception I allowed was for contraception. I'll bet that if you gave me a month to prepare and $50,000 for expenses, I could go out into the country and find a practicing Catholic who has ever used birth control. Will you take me up on it? :)
Further, I'll bet you anything that a much greater percentage of Catholics vote for candidates who give Christianity lip service, but don't live their professed faith. How many of the most liberal people in Congress call themselves Catholics? I don't say it is the fault of "Catholicism" that these people vote with satan, but I sure don't see them being called to account by the Catholic community. In fact, to a much greater degree I believe evangelical Protestants will drop the hammer. That is what killed McVain in 2000, and could be his downfall again in '08. For goodness sakes, there are sixty-something million of you guys in this country alone. If you organized and supported only Godly candidates, there wouldn't be any liberals. Where is your opposition?
Again, I do not want to insult any Protestant in what I have to say negative about Protestantism. The genuine sympathy that nearly everyone has for the past two popes, as well as for leaders such as Billy Graham or Falwell is very heart warming and is a testimony to the Christian faith we all have in common. It is typically when we get into the more dogmatic precincts of the faith that we find things to dislike. Moreover, please do not underestimate the respect I have for the political aspect of conservative evangelical Christianity, which is admirably solid in its support for conservative values. I am only speaking of trends that, I believe, arise from the Protestant dogma that are not salutary in their impact on the world.
removal of books
The Christian Canon of scripture was determined in early 5th century, last at the Council of Carthage in AD 419. Since then, and in fact for most of the preceding history of the Christian Church, the following books comprised the Canon of the Old Testament:
The five books of Moses (Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy), Josue, Judges, Ruth, the four books of Kings, two of Paralipomenon, the first and second of Esdras (which latter is called Nehemias), Tobias, Judith, Esther, Job, the Davidic Psalter (in number one hundred and fifty Psalms), Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, the Canticle of Canticles, Wisdom, Ecclesiasticus, Isaias, Jeremias, with Baruch, Ezechiel, Daniel, the twelve minor Prophets (Osee, Joel, Amos, Abdias, Jonas, Micheas, Nahum, Habacue, Sophonias, Aggeus, Zacharias, Malachias), two books of Machabees, the first and second.We can disregard the variations in the titles. The important thing is that the Old Testament Canon included seven books that at the time were not in the Hebrew Canon: Tobias, Judith, Baruch, Ecclesiasticus, Wisdom, First and Second Machabees; some passages from Esther and Daniel were not in the Hebrew Canon either. They were retained by the Christian Canon because they were part of the Septuagint, the Greek translation of the sacred Hebrew books, that was in use till AD 90 by both Christians and Jews, and till today by Christians who read Greek. Let me reiterate, at the time when the Church was formed the "scripture" meant Septuagint. It is therefore logical that Septuagint be the Old Testament part of the deposit of faith left by Christ, despite what later became of the Jewish canon. The Jews had reasons of their own to discard the seven books in question, the so-called "Deuterocanonical" books. By AD 90 the Jews separated from the Christians of Jewish origin and began to consider them apostates; it is reasonable to suspect that rejection of the more recent deuterocanonical books had something to do with their rejection not only of Christianity but of all the modern trends of the time.(Trent)
It is true that inclusion into the canon of some books of both the Old and the New testaments were variously disputed by Christian fathers also, especially Origen. The deuterocanonical books were disputed because of the canon revision by the Jews, but some New Testament books were also questioned, e.g. the Apocalypse of St. John, and other books were considered as candidates, e.g. the letters of pope Clement to the Corinthians and the Protoevangelium of James. But the three Carthage councils, last in AD 419, put an end to the dispute till the Reformation.
Luther argued against several canonical books: the deuterocanonicals and the Letter of James, and may be some others. He was persuaded to keep the Letter of James, but the deuterocanonical books he first separated as an addendum that he called "apocrypha" and then dropped altogether. The different, reduced Protestant Canon of the Old Testament was created.
The reason Luther objected to the Deuterocanonicals that is usually cited is twofold: that references to some form of communion with the departed souls are made throughout these books, thus reinforcing the doctrine of Purgatory, which Luther disliked; and that they were not a part of the Hebrew canon.
The Council of Trent (1546) affirmed the Christian Canon in full. That was in response to Luther's challenge, as was the purpose of the entire council. The fact that Trent was very explicit in stating the inspired nature of the deuterocanonical books is sometimes distorted to support the notion that Trent added these books to some mythically original, conformant with Luther's, canon. This notion is patently false, -- it is sufficient to look at any Bible prior to Luther's, east of west, and see that the deuterocanonicals are there, in their rightful place.
The Catholic bibles today contain the complete Christian Canon. For the English translations see Douay-Rheims Bible, which is the oldest (older than King James) translation perfectly matching the Vulgate. More modern complete translations are also available in Catholic stores.
The Orthodox Bible contains the entire Catholic Canon plus sometime the Third book of the Machabees.
For more detailed treatment of the issue, see Canon of the Old Testament
I will take a break and respond to the rest of your post later.
That is without warrant. What Christ handed down was oral tradition and the Septuagint illuminated by the oral tradition. His mandate to the Apostles was to teach the Gospel, not write a book. Their first order of business was to establish a liturgical tradition, because it is through fixed rituals and memorized prayers that a doctrine is maintained and propagated in a semi-literate world where books were luxury. Most letters were written to address specific local errors or give personal advice when a meeting face-to-face was impractical. The gospels were written later to fix in generational memory certain guideposts; it is rather clear that the evangelists did not intend to create an encyclopedia of Christ's teaching but rather put on paper the bare facts and verbatim quotes as they remembered them. Even the basic facts, such as who wrote what gospel are not known from any canonical scripture. Much of the teaching of Christ remained oral tradition till one Church Father or another wrote it down centuries later. Some imagery from that period survives in the iconographic tradition. We know how Christ looked from tradition, -- till the shroud of Turin confirmed the iconographic tradition over a thousand years later. It is true of course that the oral tradition is inherently fluid and needs to be taken on faith only inasmuch as it is consistent as a whole; consequently, the writings of the early Church fathers are not canonical and are considered authoritative only in where they have a consensus. If I can find one verse which means something concrete in context in the canonical scripture it pretty much closes the argument. If I can find one phrase in the non-canonical writings of the Fathers, no matter how clearly that father's position is seen, I need to find a consensus among others to prove that this is the teaching of Christ. That is the difference between canonical scripture and oral (i.e. patristic, written to us) tradition. If the Protestant view on the patristic tradition were like I describe, there would have been no reason for us to disagree, but then there would be no "sola scriptura". As it is, the Protestant position is not to be more cautious in the study of the Fathers, but to ignore them unless something suits their agenda (which is, exclusively, fragments from St. Augustine).
Protestantism disobeys the RCC, not the "Church that Christ established".
RCC means Roman Catholic Church. Do you obey the Eastern Catholic Church? Do you obey the Orthodox Church? The Ethiopian Church? Any other continuing-tradition Church? You do not, do you? Aside from the completely unsubstantiated "trail of blood" legend in the case of the Baptists, Protestantism cannot point to any historical patrimony leading to the 1 century. What we know from historical evidence, -- the same fathers you ignore, -- points to a highly rutualistic liturgy centered around the Eucharist and lead by a priest, who is consecrated by a bishop, who in turn obeys, or at least is supposed to obey Rome, in a hierarchical structure, similar if not identical to the hierarchies that exist today in apostolic churches. Councils were called to define doctrine as private interpretations of the scripture not consonant with the consensus of the bishops were condemned and anathemized. I can recognize my Church in the writings of Justin Martyr, Clement, Ignatius or Irenaeus, -- can you?
We just don't agree with you on their [the sacraments'] meaning
But a sacrament has a defined meaning. The Holy Communion is the body and blood of Christ and has to come from a priest. Confession to a priest leads to absolution of sin; confession to a layman does not. These are articles of faith the Protestants do not agree with. But these are the sacraments of the historical apostolic Church. What you have, -- a memorial of the last supper and confession to a layman or to the congregation are nice things to do, but they are not the sacraments of the Church.
Who are these children who are being deprived of baptism in Protestant churches?
Many, -- indeed not all, -- Protestant churches would not baptize a child before the age of reason. This deprives that child of the grace of baptism and endangers his soul should he die unbaptized.
We deny the necessity of man-driven works
But then you deny scripture. When Christ commanded us to feed the hungry, clothe the poor, etc. He did not say anything about man-driven, He just said, do it. The ending chapter of the Apocalypse is clear on that: "my reward is with me, to render to every man according to his works". We agree, incidentally, that it is faith that drives works of charity, but we don't consider it an excuse not to "work out our salvation in fear and trembling" (Phillipians 2:12).
Who is crumbling on any of these things (except one)?
Like I said, some Protestant communities do a wonderful job in the conservative vineyard; others are in complete acquiescence to the liberal agenda. But the movement away from parochial schools was a Protestant project, that has lead to the scandal of publik skulz of today. The idea that one can be justified in reading the Scripture, arriving at a private interpretation of it, and start his own church based on it, has defined modernity with its moral relativism. But this is the fundamental Protestant idea. The notion that a bunch of lawyers and politicians can go and starve an innocent disabled woman to death because an electoral process of law has lead to it, -- I am referring to Terri Schiavo, of course, -- is a direct product of the mentality according to which everyone is his own pope and therefore entitled to autonomous moral judgement.
The one aspect of moral law on which you admit Protestantism has defected en masse (Lambeth Conference, 1930) is contraception. But this is the cornerstone of moral order that was destroyed by the left, -- and now, of course, the Church is waging a lone, despairing battle to steer at least its own flock away from that sin. Once a moral approval was given to sex as a way for people to push Creator God out of the marital bedroom, Chritian marriage was destroyed. Mariage became temporary cohabitative arrangement between any kind or number of partners; love became masturbatory; child became a contraceptive failure. Adultery, perversion, divorce, abortion were to follow by an iron logic: hide from God, and you will find Satan.