The problem is that under Sola Scriptura, Swedenborg and the Jehovah's Witnesses came to their power USING Sola Scriptura. No.
No, as actually like Joe Smith and others, their veracity was and is not dependent the degree of Scriptural substantiation, which is the harder but SCriptural means of unity, but instead they basically effectively operated under the RC model of sola ecclesia, in which the leadership presumes a peculiar anointing of ensured veracity so that Scripture assuredly means what they said, and implicit assent is required.
Thus, like in cults, faithful RCs are not to objectively examine evidences in order to ascertain the veracity of official RC teaching, as
"He is as sure of a truth when declared by the Catholic Church as he would be if he saw Jesus Christ standing before him and heard Him declaring it with His Own Divine lips." (Henry G. Graham, "What Faith Really Means")
...in all cases the immediate motive in the mind of a Catholic for his reception of them is, not that they are proved to him by Reason or by History, but because Revelation has declared them by means of that high ecclesiastical Magisterium which is their legitimate exponent." — John Henry Newman, “A Letter Addressed to the Duke of Norfolk on Occasion of Mr. Gladstone's Recent Expostulation.”
Which even pertains to history and tradition:
It was the charge of the Reformers that the Catholic doctrines were not primitive, and their pretension was to revert to antiquity. But the appeal to antiquity is both a treason and a heresy. It is a treason because it rejects the Divine voice of the Church at this hour, and a heresy because it denies that voice to be Divine. — Most Rev. Dr. Henry Edward Cardinal Manning, “The Temporal Mission of the Holy Ghost: Or Reason and Revelation”
But cults actually enforce the SE model more strictly, as Rome used to do, and thus they have more unity. It is much harder to have
renounced the hidden things of dishonesty, not walking in craftiness, nor handling the word of God deceitfully; but by manifestation of the truth commending ourselves to every man's conscience in the sight of God. (2 Corinthians 4:2)
The Body of Christ is one Body with one Faith following one Christ. That is a narrow definition. But it is the definition of Ephesians 3.
That is true, as it refers to the corporate body of Christ consisting of only believers, and certainly does not refer to the organic church, including Rome.
he fact is that the Church did not begin substantiating everything it said with Scripture.
Actually it did, with Peter following His Lord by explaining the miracle of Pentecost from Scripture, preaching
the gospel of God, "Which he had promised afore by his prophets in the holy scriptures," "But now is made manifest, and by the scriptures of the prophets, according to the commandment of the everlasting God, made known to all nations for the obedience of faith: " (Romans 1:2; 16:26)
And the Lord began His public ministry referencing Scripture and after His res. He substantiated from that same and opened the understanding of the disciples to it, not to tradition. And in between that time and in the preaching of the apostles all things were explicitly or implicitly subject to examination by Scripture as the supreme source.
The Lord did provide new revelation, consistent with the principal of progressive and new but conflative complementary revelation, but Rome does not claim to provide new revelation or speak as inspired writers of Scripture.
The Council in Acts directly goes against Scripture's commands to follow the dietary and physical portions of the Mosaic law,
Again your every argument is an argument against you, as that was not actually against Scripture but a fulfillment of it, as the New Covenant was "not according" to that of Mt. Sinai, and James, who provided the definitive judgment, substantiates this with Scripture.
And the decree that the Gentiles abstain “from pollutions of idols, and from fornication, and from things strangled, and from blood” (Acts 15:20,29; cf. 21:25) was itself based upon Scripture. (Gn. 35:2; Ex. 34:15-16; Ezek. 30:30,31; Gn. 34:1,2,31; Dt. 22:28,29; 2Chron. 21:11; Gn. 9:4; Lv. 7:27; 17:13,14)
Following Sola Scriptura, the Judaizers SHOULD have won out in the Council.
Wrong, as this shows a very superficial view of Scriptural judgments and or of Scripture, as the New Covenant is clearly Scriptural, as is the principal of progressive conflative complementary revelation, which we see in Scripture and see what James said, but which Rome does not speak as wholly God-inspired men. You can only wish such things as praying to departed beings in Heaven was consistent with Scripture, versus basically adding to it what the Spirit never inspired.
Certainly, the Church Triumphant (meaning the Church comprised of those who have entered Paradise), but the Church militant (meaning those on earth) is not comprised of some nebulous, unidentifiable grouping. The Church Militant fits the definition of
Ephesians 3.
What are you talking about? Eph. 3 is about the One New Man, that of the coporate body of Christ, not a particular organic church: "That the Gentiles should be fellowheirs, and of the same body, and partakers of his promise in Christ by the gospel." (Ephesians 3:6)
The next chapter speaks of offices within that church, but no church in the NT corresponds to the distinctive Catholic church. Here is a list by the grace of God.
Protestantism is many bodies with many faiths.
Esp. as the term is used by Caths, but you cannot compare one particular church with many, and cults actually are tops in unity, yet comparing the fruit under two different models is valid. And in which as said, those who esteem Scripture the most as the wholly inspired and accurate word of God testify to
far greater unity than the over fruit of Rome.
Take for example Soteriology. Is Soteriology not a core doctrine?
Certainly, and one that unities evangelicals, as being justified by faith on Christ's account, not our own, with the heart being purified by faith and born again, as Peter preached, (Acts 10?:43; 15:7-11) which both Arminians and Calvinsts hold to, versus becoming good enough to be with God via sprinkling an infant and then (for most) thru purgatory later. Salvation by grace thru merit.
If you want to get more technical, such as the manner of atonement, or what the Dominicans and the Jesuits went at each other for years over, that of the reconciliation of the efficacy of grace with human freedom. "Finally, after twenty years of discussion public and private, and eighty-five conferences in the presence of the popes, the question was not solved but an end was put to the disputes." -
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Congregatio_de_Auxiliis
Being led into all Truth was put on hold, but score one for an umpire, which i do not oppose in principal.
