Questions about Catholicism

Prot here, wanting to learn more about Catholic Church. I’m a sola scripture type of guy, so I’ll only go by what I see in the Bible. Where in there does it say to pray to saints or where does it lay out the structure of the church. I’ve never really understood Catholicism myself, but I’m interested. Thanks I’m advance
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Be warned: every pro rcc argument is first predicated on a rejection of the Protestant view of the sufficiency of scripture

This. They'll start by trying to convince you that you should trust their tradition because "the same Catholic church" (lol) compiled the Bible.

What’s rcc mean? Bear with me here

It doesn't, but neither does the Church. This is a very simple concept: we don't pray TO saints, we ask saints to pray for us. Do you not understand the difference? If you need a Biblical reference for the saints praying for us, look to Rev. 4:10, 5:8, 6:9-11.
Jesus chose the Apostles and placed Peter as the Rock upon which the Church would be built. When Judas, an Apostle, betrayed Christ, Matthias was chosen in his place. This sets up what we now call "Apostolic Succession". Simplified, but it's there.

Where in the Bible does it say to obey the Bible alone? :^)

Roman catholic church

2 Timothy 3:16-17

That says that scripture is divinely inspired, and is profitable to follow. It does not say that it should be followed alone. Emphasis on alone.

Might want to read that again. It doesn't say that the Bible is the sole source. It says that Scripture is useful for teaching, etc; but nothing there says it is the only source. Paul clearly states earlier in the letter "yet from them all the Lord rescued me" (2 Tim 3:11) Not the Bible … the Lord!

Saint Paul was referring to the OT, for the NT was not even compiled yet.

Did you read verse 17? And yes, the Lord saved Paul, but the Bible is the Lord's word.

So the NT isn't scripture?

Don't take things out of context, bruh. Yes the NT is scripture as defined by the Church, but that passage is cherry picked wrongly by Protestants, since Saint Paul is specifically referring to the OT.

Also, it wouldn't make sense if he was only talking about the old testament, because verse 17 says that scripture makes the man of God complete, equipped for every good work. That would imply ritual sacrifice and killing people who sin is okay.

Paul never read the NT. He didn't know it existed.
Yes, but it is not the end of the Lord's word. Peter's successor continues Apostolic Tradition as Christ's representative. Pope Linus, first successor to Peter, is even named in 2 Timothy.

What about your church? Can you show us in the Bible where your church had to file Articles of Incorporation to be considered an actual church? Assuming you're American, that is, and actually go to a church.

So st Paul said that the old testament, which talked about constantly sacrificing animals as atonement for sins, would equip the man of God for every good work?

Pretty much, yep. He even mentions it himself in his letter to the Hebrews. (9:22) and without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness of sins

Then why does the Apostolic canon include OT “apocrypha”?

What does even have to do with what Saint Paul is referring to?

Specific praising in heaven. Twenty-four elders has different definitions but lets assume it's 24 actual people. (Maybe 12 heads of the tribes of Israel and the 12 apostles as some are want to say)

Nowhere does it define a mechanism by which they have "heard" the prayers of those on earth. It is a prayer generated from within their own hearts in heaven.

Rev 5:8

Getting closer at least. They are holding bowls signifying the "prayers of God's people" but that in no way means they heard our prayers, and then "prayed for us". If anything the prayers have remained the same as the people who prayed them, and are now being offered to God.

Rev 6:9-11

Once again the martyrs are praying personally, not hearing prayers from the saints on earth, and then transmuting that into their own prayer towards God.

"How long, Sovereign Lord, holy and true, until you judge the inhabitants of the earth and avenge our blood?"

Notwithstanding that to extrapolate the doctrine of general prayers to saints outside of the context of a specific prayer describing an eschatological event is also a little bit unwieldy. You have to take the specific event and expand it to support your general conclusion, of which the Bible doesn't provide much help so you have to fill in the gaps trying to make your patchwork doctrine look "holy" enough to be "biblical".

Useless to argue this since it's been argued a billion times on this website. If you're protestant you will never agree that Peter specifically is being ordained as a pope here. Nor do I think the rest of scripture supports that view. Peter's mission was local to Jerusalem. If anything Paul should be considered the Pope.

And if you go a few verses down you find the implication that constant sacrifice is unsupported by Paul.

"26 Otherwise Christ would have had to suffer many times since the creation of the world. But he has appeared once for all at the culmination of the ages to do away with sin by the sacrifice of himself."

One sacrifice for all time.

If the Bible is divinely inspired (which it is) then the Author (God) lies outside of time. To say that 2 Tim only covers the OT and not the NT because of Paul is infeasible to the primary consistency of scripture. Was God also saying that only part of his writing was profitable and the rest is subject to question simply because Paul didn't know about it?

It says "All Scripture" not "All Scripture up to this point".

I'm a recent convert to the RCC, and was in your shoes several months ago. I'd encourage you to read 1 Timothy 3:15 and meditate on it for a moment.

Note that church is spelled with a lowercase c, implying it's a building known as a church (aka the house of God), not "The Church" with a capital C like the Roman Catholic Church is always saying. 2 Thessalonians 2:15 does say to follow the traditions they've been taught, but why would the apostles teach them traditions that go against scripture? Calling a priest father, re-sacrificing Christ at the mass, believing that the bread and wine is His literal body and blood instead of being a symbol by which to remember him, etc.

Say what? They didn't even use modern grammar like that in Paul's day. Half of the time, ALL of the words were even bundled up in NT manuscripts (no spaces between words) to save space.. and could be all lowercase or all caps.

But to think Christ didn't have a greater vision for his people than just some mere building is retarded. If the "church" was meant to be so forgettable it wouldn't have conquered the world as it did. It's cosmic in scope.

True in modern English but this capitalization is irrelevant for our purposes

OK I see how my previous point was pretty flawed. But looking back at the verse, it says the house of God is the church. The house of God is where God lives right? And scripture tells us that we have Christ in us (2 Corinthians 13:5, Romans 8:10, Galatians 2:20, Galatians 4:19, Ephesians 3:17, Colossians 1:27) and we know that Christ is God. Therefore, it would take no mental gymnastics at all to see that the church is made of the believers of Christ, who have him in them.

Which detail of your reasoning doesn't equally apply to the local church?
Remember that the very word ekklesia means a physical assembly.

Yes, and you can have a local assembly that is not the Roman Catholic Church, one that follows scripture and not the traditions of man as Jesus intended.

In that case, I wonder why more Prots aren't in the "Church of Christ"/Campbell movement. They're the only ones I've seen that truly live up to "sola scriptura". The rest of you are posers.

I agree, I really only interjected for that last point.
You're right that Catholic apologists frequently conflate instructions to local churches as applicable their parachurch institution as a power grab.

Dang, I may just become Catholic after watching and reading your post.

There is not a proof text for sola scriptura because the Bible never explicitly teaches it, just like it never explicitly demands infant baptism or explicitly forbids infant baptism. The doctrine is based on the relevant passages on scripture and the biblical characters's use of internal reference, to conclude that the authority of any teaching is entirely dependant upon the consistency of that teaching with the scripture.

The clearest example is that of the Berrean Jews in acts 17 who are affirmed for checking everything the apostle Paul says against the scripture.

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There is no biblical support for sola scriptura and leads to weak theology. One can see the fruits if protestantism for what it is given the multitude of denominations.

If the Roman Catholic Church under Pope Francis, and the bishops in communion with him, then there is no Church of Christ.

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So, is Jesus Christ the Word of God?
Is Jesus God?
If this is true, then the Word of God is God.
Is the Bible the Word of God?
If the Bible is the Word of God (Jesus Christ), then the Bible is Jesus Christ.

Jesus Christ ought to carry more authority than human beings, who are not Jesus Christ, even if they claim guidance from him.

This doesn’t require any fancy doctrine. It’s literally a logical deduction.

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So, there’s a “Word of God,” which is Jesus, and then there’s ANOTHER “Word of God,” which is the Bible? How many words of God are there?
God is not the author of confusion.

which criteria are you investigating for the "fruits"?
Surely you don't mean the very premise of a multiplicity of denominations

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The Bible is very clear in saying that the Word became man. As far as I know, the Bible was never incarnate as a living man here on Earth, only Christ was. Thus the Word must be Christ.

2 Timothy 3:16-17 shows the inspiration of, the value of and the ultimate sufficiency of all scripture. All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: that the man of God may be perfect, throughly furnished unto all good works. Perfect meaning complete. Verse 17 is a final clause, also known as a purposive clause. Considering then that God is the one who purposed it to do this, we know that it does do this. The only problem is if you somehow doubt that God could provide this.

Yes, there is no mistake here, all scripture means all. There is not a mistake here. What you read is correct, it is not incorrectly only referring to some. God would not inspire Paul to write something that is not in fact actually true. We're really getting to the basic trustworthiness of scripture at this point, since this guy has bad motivations to change it so badly.