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I am jumping in kind of late, but here goes:

These discussions assume the basic premise that God's Church must exist within (and only within) some earthly bureaucracy. Christ never headed an "earthly kingdom," although that is what the Jews wanted. They wanted someone to be "King" and liberate them from the power of the Romans. Catholics have always claimed that Christ's Church must exist in some earthly bureaucracy, and they are the only one with a 2000 year history.

Christ's kingdon is "not of this world." Christ's Church, all true believers, has existed from NT times.

Church was used in two ways in the NT. Usually as a local body of believers (i.e. The Church of Ephesus, the Church that meets in your home, etc.) but it occasionally meant all believers.

Examples:

...because I persecuted the church of God. - Paul persecuted believers.

And hath put all things under his feet, and gave him to be the head over all things to the church, - Christ is head of all believers. If it were some earthly organization, the head would be someone like the pope. Not Christ.

Catholics have always claimed that Christ's Church must exist in some earthly bureaucracy, and they are the only one with a 2000 year history.

But then, what can be said for the Reformation popes? When you think of them, murder and politics and greed and warfare and worldly ways are the only phrases that describe them. And the Prots didn't cause that; it happened for a long time before Luther. The unholiness of the hierarchy was an absolute public scandal for centuries before the Reformation.

If the claims of the Roman hierarchy rest upon an unbroken line of apostolic succession, what happens to those claims when we can demostrate how utterly unholy the Roman pontiffs were, pope after pope. Honestly examined, isn't the best that can possibly be said is that the college of cardinals eventually elected popes who weren't so corrupt? And that, in worldly terms, the Roman church has shown a certain improvement over the centuries since? (fewer bookburnings, no official inquisition, etc.) Even so, we still can't say with any confidence that post-Reformation Roman reforms have restored Christ to His proper place in the theology of the Roman church.

When a line of succession is broken, you can't actually restore it. I'd say the spirit of God departed a church led by such men. And I consistently say the same thing about modern church ministries for far fewer offenses against the Bible and its teachings. But I don't think that the wickedness and unholiness of the Reformation popes affected the eternal destiny of ordinary believers in the Roman church of their time, namely those who who loved Christ and led blameless lives in God's own grace. But perhaps I just hate to think that God didn't prevail to redeem some of those souls despite the unholy leadership. It's just my opinion, my hope. After all, we are not powerful enough to either save or damn any other person. This is also the case with popes of any flavor, Roman or Protestant or otherwise. We Protestants aren't entirely immune to some flirting with popery ourselves from time to time.