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All-in-all, my interest in arguing over the contents of the Canon is extremely limited — real short. It is because I believe that God didn't leave that ultimately in the hands of man. I believe that God, even today, is pro-active in Superintending the preservation of His Words.

There are efforts in Mongolia, China and the Philippines at better translation work. My eldest son is a degreed, trained and experienced linguist, working in Asia. He tells me many stories in which the characters are often very common Christians astounding him and other of the trained ones with an uncanny ability to translate correctly and offer sound advice — common widom — or spiritual insight over the science of the thing.

Whose councils were involved in the past, and who tried to limit this and that for their own benefit, how educated or uneducated people were, is not uninteresting, but the arguments do tend to get too academic, as they make it look like a science classroom where God Himself is unwelcome.

God Himself has His “Personal interests” in the preservation of His Words from generation-to-generation. He does that even when the educated miss it and flub up. He has the power and prerogative to over-rule.

With regards to the Pope, my understanding is that we believe that the Holy Spirit is infallable. Since we believe that the Pope is guided by the Holy Spirit, he becomes infallable. Pope, the man, is fallable.

I may have read that from encyclicals of John Paul II. I wish I could remember.

I found the following from his encyclicals, since it was online I'm not sure how accurate it is, but it is pretty much in line with his writings.

-People outside the Catholic Church and the Gospel can attain salvation by grace of Christ (1990, 1.10).

-People can be saved by living a moral life, without knowing anything about Christ and the Catholic Church (1993, 3).

-There is sanctification outside the boundaries of the Catholic Church (1995, 1.12).

-The martyrs of any religious community can find the extraordinary grace of the Holy Spirit (1995, 3.84).

Our Christian history is facsinating. I imagine it would be hard to understand our beliefs and traditions without understanding our history.

"Through envy and jealousy, the greatest and most righteous pillars [of the Church] have been persecuted and put to death. Let us set before our eyes the illustrious apostles. Peter, through unrighteous envy, endured not one or two, but numerous labours and when he had at length suffered martyrdom, departed to the place of glory due to him." Clement of Rome, The First Epistle of Clement, 5 (c. A.D. 96).