so I changed my mind

It's a free country :) right? Stellman and Hahn changed their mind, that's ok, right? You changed your mind, so it seems. Is it only ok to change your mind, to have a change of heart if you go INTO the RC and not out OUT OF? Lots of people have left the RC...lots...and I guess, according to the RC, they are going to burn for eternity in hell, but they still leave. But I guess I won't since I never officially joined, so at least I have that going for me.

Trust me, I'm as shocked as you are. But looking back on it and being honest with myself, I think I was saying those things, reading all that I was reading, trying to convince myself that it was true. Does that make sense? Like you want something badly, but you're just not quite there, so you go in deep assuming that it will just happen eventually. Have you done this or know other people who have? Maybe with a car purchase for example, you rationalize all the reasons you *need* this car or that gadget or whatever. But for many, in the end, they just go with their gut and toss off the data. Or maybe go against their conscience even.

Did I change my mind by applying to logic and reason? Well, God gave us mind, body, soul, the Holy Spirit, etc, so I use all that God has given my and weigh both sides with plenty of data. And in the end, I don't think the Scriptures can be on equal footing with anyone or anything. And in fact, that was the view of the ECFs. For centuries, they held the view that the Scriptures were the only source of doctrine and truth and was the ultimate authority in doctrinal controversies. <-- I realize there is a lot to unpack in this statement, but it does not change the the nature of the Holy Writ.

I'm not sure if we're still "doing this" or not. Sounds like you are checking out by ignoring my previous emails and trying make my poor mental condition :) an excuse to just drop out. I'm going to send the following as something I read, I digested and will copy/paste and regurgitate as best I can to make a point.

So it wasn't until Trent ( and again at Vatican 1 ) that the Church was forced to firm up where they got indulgences, purgatory, celibate priests, papal supremacy, etc. So they came up with this 'unanimous consent of the fathers' idea. What interesting is even though they came up with this *principal*, Trent *merely affirmed the existence of the principle without providing documentary proof* for its validity. DOH!

Which is why you then have Johann Gerhard and Martin Chemnitz responding they way they did. They actually provided the documentation that the ECFs DID NOT in fact affirm the principals the RC claimed. Their work in pointing this out had such an impact that it has been said without the second Martin, the Reformation ( Lutheranism ) would have been undone...and where would we be now :) with just Catholicism and Calvinism...perish the thought. Just kidding. I'm sure there would still be thousands of denoms. Just like early controversies, various sects had numerous and rabid followers.

So, the principle of unanimous agreement/consent was three-fold...encompassing universality (believed everywhere), antiquity (believed always) and consent (believed by all). It seems it was first put forth by a Vincent of Lerins, who, by the way, readily agreed with the principle of sola Scriptura, that is, that Scripture was sufficient as the source of truth. But he was concerned about how one determined what was truly apostolic and catholic doctrine. This was the official position of the Church immediately subsequent to Vincent throughout the Middle Ages and for centuries immediately following Trent. But this principle, while fully embraced by Trent and Vatican I, has all been but abandoned by Rome today in a practical and formal sense.

Why? It is due to the fact that so much of Rome's teachings, upon historical examination, fail the test of unanimous consent. Some Roman Catholic historians are refreshingly honest in this assessment. Patrologist Boniface Ramsey, for example, candidly admits that the current Roman Catholic teachings on Mary and the papacy were not taught in the early Church:

Sometimes, then, the Fathers speak and write in a way that would eventually be seen as unorthodox. But this is not the only difficulty with respect to the criterion of orthodoxy. The other great one is that we look in vain in many of the Fathers for references to things that many Christians might believe in today. We do not find, for instance, some teachings on Mary or the papacy that were developed in medieval and modern times.

At first, this clear lack of patristic consensus led Rome to embrace a new theory in the late nineteenth century to explain its teachings—the theory initiated by John Henry Newman known as the development of doctrine. In light of the historical reality, Newman had come to the conclusion that the Vincentian principle of unanimous consent was unworkable, because, for all practical purposes, it was nonexistent. To quote Newman:
"It does not seem possible, then, to avoid the conclusion that, whatever be the proper key for harmonizing the records and documents of the early and later Church, and true as the dictum of Vincentius must be considered in the abstract, and possible as its application might be in his own age, when he might almost ask the primitive centuries for their testimony, it is hardly available now, or effective of any satisfactory result. The solution it offers is as difficult as the original problem."

Leaving out some stuff so as to fast forward. If you want to read the whole article, I can send you link...which brings us to post-19th century Vatican 1, current RC thought as quoted below by Karl Keating ( you've probably heard of him )

"Still, fundamentalists ask, where is the proof from Scripture? Strictly, there is none. It was the Catholic Church that was commissioned by Christ to teach all nations and to teach them infallibly. The mere fact that the Church teaches the doctrine of the Assumption as definitely true is a guarantee that it is true."

Whoa-ho-ho. That's strong words. So basically NOTHING has to have any support in the Bible OR by a unanimous consent of the fathers. They have evolved from the Scripture alone to a body that says they don't even need support from GODS HOLY WORD! Sounds sorta like Progressive Christianity to me.

It was this sort of evolution I'm talking about that troubles me. I had sent several emails about how things were just not clicking, having a tough time, starting to break down, etc. So it really wasn't "out of nowhere". One of them, you may remember, was how late in the game any sort of 'extra-biblical' doctrine of Mary started to develop. I mean, 300 - 400 years after Pentecost. And then it wasn't until the late 1800's that it was made dogma.
If you ask, 'how can they just create new dogmas' i guess they could say 'well, we're the church, we have the right ( that's what Keating is saying ), the power the authority to do this or that' and then you ask 'who gave you that authority' and they say 'well, we did.' BECAUSE THEY DID. They gave it to themselves. It's a bit circular really. Some may say the doctrine of Sola Scriptura is circular, but upon further reflection, I think you will see it's not. But this whole thing about how the RC is allowed to change the rules of the game because they are the RC...progressive, evolving, transitional.

The Scriptures COULD NOT SUPPORT their teachings, so then it was the unanimous consent of the father's, nope, that won't work either, so they had to evolve into something that allowed them to perpetuate their existence without ANY reliance on the HOLY SCRIPTURES or ECFs. None. If the RC teaches a doctrine, IT MUST BE TRUE because She says so.