Your understanding of Tradition is erroneous. The examples you give do not constitute any argument at all against a coherent Apostolic Tradition as regards liturgy, let alone doctrine.
For instance, when speaking of the Liturgy for the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, it is perfectly obvious that there are different customs and different rites. (You announce this as if it would be news to me!).
There are 22 official Capital-R Rites (that is to say, major, historically distinguishable liturgical traditions) in the Catholic Church, including the Chaldean, the Coptic, the Mozarabic, the Melkite, the Maronite, the Greek Catholic Byzantine, etc., as well as different Eucharistic Canons in use within a single ritual tradition, e.g. the Latin (Western) Church uses a variety of canons.
It’s not the tiny distinctives that constitute Apostolic Tradition,( e.g. whether you cross yourself from right to left or from left to right, whether you have an Iconostasis or Rood Screen or a Communion Rail or whether you receive Communion standing or kneeling, etc.). What makes it Apostolic Tradition is the basics which we all share, across the continents, the cultures and the centuries, which come from the Apostolic teaching whether in Antioch or Lyons or Jerusalem or Alexandria, or Ctesiphon or Cadiz or Milan or Crete or Constantinople or Hippo or Rome.
The reason I list the mini-geographical gazette is that what we’re looking for is not uniformity of language, expression and culture (impossible) but the amazing agreement on the basics, which is why all these far-flung churches are said go be IN COMMUNION WITH EACH OTHER.
What are these amazing commonalities? Brother, it would take a library and a lifetime -— but it comes down to these basic points:
*Hierarchical structure: the faithful assembled around their bishop
*Eucharistic realism: the Real Presence of Christ -—Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity ,-— in the Sacrifice of the Mass (or Divine Liturgy or however they want to call it)
*The Sacramental life
*the various Creeds (which preceded the Canon of the NT and determined the Canon of of the NT )-— It is essential to grasp that the Creeds determined what is accepted as Scripture, and not t’other way around: Apostles’ Creed, Nicene Creed, Athanasian Creed, etc.
*the veneration of holy persons, holy places, and holy things
*distinctive doctrines about Mary -— her status as the handmaid of the Lord her Savior, her ever-virginity, her sinlessness, her Assumption (or Dormition or however it is variously termed) whether it is formally defined or undefined
*intercessory prayer understood to include the whole Body of Christ, and not just the minority of members who happen to be walking around on the earth right now
*praying for the faithful departed, and asking the blessed in heaven to pray with us and for us.
I’m on my Kindle and away from my computer, so I don’t have access to my links and resources, and this is generated out of my memory and incomplete even as an outline.
It is necessary to grasp the basics before you are equipped to have a sensible opinion about liturgies, rites, and the development of doctrine.
I’m trying to supply you with the bare-minimum historic perspective. All the truths here are due to the Holy Spirit’s promised guidance of the Church.
All the obscurity, inadequacy or error is my own!
Is it not the theory that the disciples passed on everything they new to the next generation? Everything the Apostles knew they handed down....this rules out any new doctrines.
Yet we see the development of new doctrines in Roman Catholicism.
The examples you give do not constitute any argument at all against a coherent Apostolic Tradition as regards liturgy, let alone doctrine.
Beg to differ.
If one cannot trace the origins of one of their most important sacraments then that doesn't bode well for "Apostolic Tradition".
*distinctive doctrines about Mary -— her status as the handmaid of the Lord her Savior, her ever-virginity, her sinlessness, her Assumption (or Dormition or however it is variously termed) whether it is formally defined or undefined
Yet as already shown....the Marian doctrines only came about starting in the 3rd/4th centuries....some even later. The "Immaculate Conception" is not found in Scripture as already noted by the Catholic Encyclopedia online and a number of the ECFs say she was a sinner. Somehow what Rome thinks is so clear is not.
Regarding the Assumption....again, the Newadvent notes, "Regarding the day, year, and manner of Our Lady's death, nothing certain is known."
In regards to the Feast of the Assumption celebrated by Roman Catholicism the Newadvent notes:
Regarding the origin of the feast we are also uncertain. It is more probably the anniversary of the dedication of some church than the actual anniversary of Our Lady's death. That it originated at the time of the Council of Ephesus, or that St. Damasus introduced it in Rome is only a hypothesis.
Two of the most sacred dogmas of Rome, and two of the known ex cathedra statements of the pope, cannot show a clear and direct teaching from the Apostles!
Roman Catholics believe it just because they want to believe it.
But what is believed is wrong!
There was no "handing down" from Paul and the other Apostles.
*Hierarchical structure: the faithful assembled around their bishop
Not witnessed in the NT church. It was a later development as noted numerous times.
*the veneration of holy persons, holy places, and holy things
Not attested to in the NT church. These were later developments as noted previously.
*intercessory prayer understood to include the whole Body of Christ, and not just the minority of members who happen to be walking around on the earth right now
And again not witnessed in the NT church.
Keep trying Mrs. D.....keep trying.
Which the Holy Spirit does not show the NT believing, and actually indicts Catholicism as being a deformation of the b NT church.
*Hierarchical structure: the faithful assembled around their bishop
Which in Catholicism is contrary to Scripture, in which, even Jerome attests, the presbuteros [elders] was the same as the bishop [episkopos], and apart from the apostles who commissioned the presbuteros/episkopos to be overseers of the church (Acts 20:28) over and among the deacons and the rest , there was no titular distinctions as in Catholicism, including the laudatory titles such as "most reverend" and ostentatious garments, akin to making "broad their phylacteries, and enlarge the borders of their garments.' (Matthew 23:5)
Nor were NT pastors called by the same distinctive name which the Holy Spirit distinctively uses for a separate sacerdotal (sacrificing) class in the New Testament ((“hiereus”/“archiereus" "priest" and "high priest" in English, over 280 times total as in Heb. 4:15; 10:11), corresponding to Old Testament "priests" (Hebrew kohen) as well as those of pagans and the general priesthood of all NT believers.
The English word "priest" is a etymological corruption of the Greek presbuteros, being referred to in Old English (around 700 to 1000 AD) as "preostas" or "preost," and finally resulting in the modern English "priest," but which in Catholicism is also used for Old Testament kohen and NT hiereus, thereby losing the distinction the Holy Spirit provided by never using the distinctive term of hiereus for NT presbuteros, or describing as them as a distinctive sacerdotal class of believers.
All believers are called to sacrifice (Rm. 12:1; 15:16; Phil. 2:17; 4:18; Heb. 13:15,16; cf. 9:9) and all constitute the only priesthood (hieráteuma) in the NT church, that of all believers, (1Pt. 2:5,9; Re 1:6; 5:10; 20:6). But nowhere are NT pastors distinctively titled hiereus, and the idea of the NT presbuteros being a distinctive class titled "hiereus" was a later development, and Catholicism attempts to justify using the same distinctive word for both OT "ko^he^n" and NT presbuteros via an imposed functional equivalence, supposing NT presbuteros engaged in a unique sacrificial ministry as their primary function. Yet neither presbuteros or episkopos are described as having any unique sacrificial function, and hiereus (as archiereus=chief priests) is used in distinction to elders in such places as Lk. 22:66; Acts 22:5.
*Eucharistic realism: the Real Presence of Christ -—Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity ,-— in the Sacrifice of the Mass (or Divine Liturgy or however they want to call it)
Which is is never described as the paramount central priestly practice of the NT church, "the source and summit of the Catholic faith," "in which our redemption is carried out," (see here by God's grace) but is only manifestly described in one letter to the churches (aside from "feast of charity" in Jude), and in which (1Cor. 10,11 ) believers have communion with Christ as do pagans with the object of their dedicatory feasts by eating together as "one bread," and it is the church as the body of Christ which they failed to effectually recognize.
And instead of dispensing bread as part of their ordained function, and offering the Lord's supper as a sacrifice for sin, neither of which NT pastors are ever described as doing in the life of the church (Acts onward, which writings show us how the NT church understood the gospels), instead the primary work of NT pastors is that of prayer and preaching. (Act 6:3,4; 2 Tim.4:2)) by which they “feed the flock” (Acts 20:28; 1Pt. 5:2) ) for the word is called spiritual "milk," (1Co. 3:22; 1Pt. 1:22) and "meat," (Heb. 5:12-14) what is said to "nourish" the souls of believers, and believing it is how the lost obtain life in themselves. (1 Timothy 4:6; ;Acts 15:7-9; cf. Psalms 19:7) In contrast, nowhere in the record of the NT church is the Lord's supper described as spiritual food, and the means of obtaining spiritual life in oneself.
*The Sacramental life
Which besides the corruptions of the Lord's supper and ordaining NT pastors as hiereus, turns baptism into a magic act by which souls are regenerated by the act itself of sprinkling of water (ex opere operato), versus the washing of regeneration with the heart being purified by the faith which is expressed in baptism, as Peter (Acts 10:43; 15:7-9) and Paul taught. (Eph. 1:13)
It also turns what in Scripture was a promise of healing into a precursor of death (normatively), in addition to requiring confession of sins to ordained priests, which nowhere exist in the NT, except towards each other in general. (James 5:14-20)
Furthermore, confirmation imagines that the ritual acting out something that God did through holy Spirit-filled apostles in Scripture will result in the same, which it manifestly does not, thus making a mockery of supernatural power. .
*the various Creeds (which preceded the Canon of the NT and determined the Canon of of the NT )-— It is essential to grasp that the Creeds determined what is accepted as Scripture, and not t’other way around: Apostles’ Creed, Nicene Creed, Athanasian Creed, etc.
Which dubious claim is clearly contrary to Scripture, in which an itinerant Preacher and disciples established Truth claims upon scriptural substantiation in word and in power, (Mt. 22:23-45; Lk. 24:27,44; Jn. 5:36,39; Acts 2:14-35; 4:33; 5:12; 15:6-21;17:2,11; 18:28; 28:23; Rm. 15:19; 2Cor. 12:12, etc.) and oral preaching was subject to testing by Scripture, not vice versa.
*the veneration of holy persons, holy places, and holy things
Which in Catholicism has lended itself to exalting mortals above that which is written, and superstition.
*distinctive doctrines about Mary -— her status as the handmaid of the Lord her Savior, her ever-virginity, her sinlessness, her Assumption (or Dormition or however it is variously termed) whether it is formally defined or undefined
The Assumption was a later development flowing from fables, and was so lacking in early testimony that is was rejected by RC scholars as being apostolic doctrine , as has been shown you.
In addition, the rest of the Marian hyper exaltation, turning the pious holy Mary of Scriptuere into an "omnipotent" (by grace) demigoddess to whom "Jesus owes His Precious Blood" to and always obeys, and that "the Holy Spirit acts only by the Most Blessed Virgin, his Spouse," etc , is that of thinking of mortals far "above that which is written" (contra 1Co. 4:6)
*intercessory prayer understood to include the whole Body of Christ, and not just the minority of members who happen to be walking around on the earth right now
*praying for the faithful departed, and asking the blessed in heaven to pray with us and for us.
Which is also utterly unseen in Scripture except by pagans, despite the Spirit of God recording approx. 200 prayers in Scripture, and despite teaching much about access to God and intercession (as in Hebrews) and despite instruction on who to pray to, and despite there always being plenty of heavenly beings to pray to.
Thus the cultic church RCs continuously compulsively promote and defend, despite being continuously reproved as you have been, is not that which is manifested in Scripture, and which they abuse as a servant compelled to support Cath traditions of men.
As regards the oft-quoted Mt. 16:18, note the following Early Church Fathers promise in the profession of faith of Vatican 1:
• Basil of Seleucia, Oratio 25:
'You are Christ, Son of the living God.'...Now Christ called this confession a rock, and he named the one who confessed it 'Peter,' perceiving the appellation which was suitable to the author of this confession. For this is the solemn rock of religion, this the basis of salvation, this the wall of faith and the foundation of truth: 'For no other foundation can anyone lay than that which is laid, which is Christ Jesus.' To whom be glory and power forever. — Oratio XXV.4, M.P.G., Vol. 85, Col. 296-297.
• Bede, Matthaei Evangelium Expositio, 3:
You are Peter and on this rock from which you have taken your name, that is, on myself, I will build my Church, upon that perfection of faith which you confessed I will build my Church by whose society of confession should anyone deviate although in himself he seems to do great things he does not belong to the building of my Church...Metaphorically it is said to him on this rock, that is, the Saviour which you confessed, the Church is to be built, who granted participation to the faithful confessor of his name. — 80Homily 23, M.P.L., Vol. 94, Col. 260. Cited by Karlfried Froehlich, Formen, Footnote #204, p. 156 [unable to verify by me].
• Cassiodorus, Psalm 45.5:
'It will not be moved' is said about the Church to which alone that promise has been given: 'You are Peter and upon this rock I shall build my Church and the gates of Hell shall not prevail against it.' For the Church cannot be moved because it is known to have been founded on that most solid rock, namely, Christ the Lord. — Expositions in the Psalms, Volume 1; Volume 51, Psalm 45.5, p. 455
• Chrysostom (John) [who affirmed Peter was a rock, but here not the rock in Mt. 16:18]:
Therefore He added this, 'And I say unto thee, Thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my Church; that is, on the faith of his confession. — Chrysostom, Homilies on the Gospel of Saint Matthew, Homily LIIl; Philip Schaff, Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers (http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/npnf110.iii.LII.html)
• Cyril of Alexandria:
When [Peter] wisely and blamelessly confessed his faith to Jesus saying, 'You are Christ, Son of the living God,' Jesus said to divine Peter: 'You are Peter and upon this rock I will build my Church.' Now by the word 'rock', Jesus indicated, I think, the immoveable faith of the disciple.”. — Cyril Commentary on Isaiah 4.2.
• Origen, Commentary on the Gospel of Matthew (Book XII):
“For a rock is every disciple of Christ of whom those drank who drank of the spiritual rock which followed them, 1 Corinthians 10:4 and upon every such rock is built every word of the church, and the polity in accordance with it; for in each of the perfect, who have the combination of words and deeds and thoughts which fill up the blessedness, is the church built by God.'
“For all bear the surname ‘rock’ who are the imitators of Christ, that is, of the spiritual rock which followed those who are being saved, that they may drink from it the spiritual draught. But these bear the surname of rock just as Christ does. But also as members of Christ deriving their surname from Him they are called Christians, and from the rock, Peters.” — Commentary on the Gospel of Matthew (Book XII), sect. 10,11 ( http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/101612.htm)
• Hilary of Potier, On the Trinity (Book II):
Thus our one immovable foundation, our one blissful rock of faith, is the confession from Peter's mouth, Thou art the Son of the living God. On it we can base an answer to every objection with which perverted ingenuity or embittered treachery may assail the truth."-- (Hilary of Potier, On the Trinity (Book II), para 23; Philip Schaff, editor, The Nicene & Post Nicene Fathers Series 2, Vol 9.