Human inventions? Did not John the Baptist and Jesus participate in the sacrament of Baptism?
Did not Jesus say, "Do this in memory of me?" - what do you think the Mass is? It is nothing more than following the instructions of Jesus when he said to "Do this in memory of me."
How do you figure that these two things are "lately-invented"? And how does following the scriptures to be Baptised and "do this in memory of me" "fly in the face of the Word of God"? They ARE the word of God!
Don't let your hatred of the Catholic Church cloud your judgement. You may be very surprised when (or if - God does not cotton to hatred and prejudice) you arrive at the gates of St. Peter!
I think that it is a waste of time to argue details that are peripheral to salvation.
When jesus says this is the rock I will build my churce upon he may have been talking about Peter (translates to small stone) or he may have been talking about the stone rejected by the builder, the stumbling stone, the rock, truth and light all ways that he described himself. Please forgive the paraphrasing, I don't have a Bible handy.
If Peter is at the pearly gate, I am happy to say, I will be there to shake his hand. I think alot of time and blood has been wasted over whether dunk vs. sprinkle, wine vs. juice, ect.
I do think that religion should be scripture based but in the end, religion will get nobody to heaven. Salvation is a personal relationship with the Savior.
Purgatory is for all those for whom the death of Christ was not enough to pay for all their sins. Thanks but I'll go with the Word of God and go straight to God's presence having been totally cleansed by the finished work of Christ on the cross.
This is waht happens when the Word of God is replaced with the ideas of men.
Interestingly this is also being debated/discussed for the last few days at http://www.freedominion.ca which is down at the moment but is under the topic of "Quebec Bishops.........."