“Tortured thinking”?
Wow! Don’t take my word for it, why not try consulting eminent Protestant theologians who converted to Catholicism.
Even single objection to Petrine Authority has been so solidly refuted that even pre-eminent Lutheran and Episcoplain theologians and pastors have defected from their Bible-Christianity and converted to Catholicism. Here are just three example. I am not talking about political leaders like Gov. Bobby Jindal who tossed out Hinduism or Tony Blair who ditched Anglicanism.
Ulf Ekman, the founder of Scandinavia’s biggest Bible school, with a congregation of some 4000 individuals, converted to Catholicism because his theological inquiry confirmed for him the indispensability of the Catholic sacraments.
Francis J. Beckwith, a “born-again” evangelical, a tenured professor at Baptist-affiliated Baylor University in Waco, Tex, was the president of the Evangelical Theological Society, an association of 4,300 Protestant theologians resigned and joined the Catholic Church. One blogger likened it to Hulk Hogan’s defection from the World Wrestling Federation to the rival World Championship Wrestling league.
Rev. Richard John Neuhaus, was a pre-eminent Lutheran theologian in America. He knew his Bible-text and history like no other Protestant. When he converted to Catholicism he said, “I have long believed that the Roman Catholic Church is the fullest expression of the church of Christ through time.”
It has been said that if you place 100 Bible-Christians in a room and give them a notepad and pencil and have them interpret a phrase of scripture, you’d have 100 different reasons they would provide for their conclusion. Don’t forget to include pastors from the AME Church as well or those Bible-faiths that ordain gay and lesbian pastors.
Thus the early Church historian J. N. D. Kelly, a Protestant, writes, “[W]here in practice was [the] apostolic testimony or tradition to be found? . . . The most obvious answer was that the apostles had committed it orally to the Church, where it had been handed down from generation to generation. . . . Unlike the alleged secret tradition of the Gnostics, it was entirely public and open, having been entrusted by the apostles to their successors, and by these in turn to those who followed them, and was visible in the Church for all who cared to look for it” (Early Christian Doctrines, 37).
Don’t take my word. Here’s one original source. St. Irenaeus:
“It is possible, then, for everyone in every church, who may wish to know the truth, to contemplate the tradition of the apostles which has been made known to us throughout the whole world. And we are in a position to enumerate those who were instituted bishops by the apostles and their successors down to our own times, men who neither knew nor taught anything like what these heretics rave about” (Against Heresies 3:3:1 [A.D. 189]).
“The true knowledge is the doctrine of the apostles, and the ancient organization of the Church throughout the whole world, and the manifestation of the body of Christ according to the succession of bishops, by which succession the bishops have handed down the Church which is found everywhere” (4:33:8).
eminent protestant theologians who have fallen into error are likely to parrot the error they have fallen into. So what?
The roman church as it exists contains grave error not even bordering on but crossing the line into heresy and apostacy. It has led millions astray and will have to answer for that. Even Paul admitted He saw through a glass darkly and He is one of the most learned and quoted church fathers.
The only true Church is the one composed of all those washed by the Blood of Christ. I am a member of that organization and have the assurance of salvation without any help from rome. You can quote your manmade authority and pray to anyone you want. I trust in Christ alone.
1 Timothy 4:1 Now the Spirit expressly says that in later times some will depart from the faith by devoting themselves to deceitful spirits and teachings of demons,
2 Corinthians 11:3 But I am afraid that as the serpent deceived Eve by his cunning, your thoughts will be led astray from a sincere and pure devotion to Christ.