>>260749
>I don't understand how Catholics can believe Mary was sinless/a virgin for the rest of her life, as that isn't in the bible and seems to contradict Christ's divinity.
On the contrary, it was necessary for her to be full of grace and free of sin in order conceive and bear God. Just read Leviticus and see how complicated it is for the High Priest to merely enter the Holiest of Holies. Imagine what it takes to actually BE the Holiest of Holies, the Ark of the New Covenant, the Tabernacle of the Lord. And once he was born the grace didn't just pack up and leave, but stayed with her the rest of her life.
>On top of that, praying to Mary and the saints and the general reverence of them seems like idolatry to me.
First off, to pray means to respectfully ask for something. In languages other than English, or if you speak a 16th century dialect of English, you might pray to the neighbour to borrow his leaf blower. There's nothing idolatrous about that. An example of idolatry is when the Israelites made a golden calf, claimed it was actually God and worshipped it as such. Nobody is claiming either Mary, the Saints, or your well-equipped neighbour is God.
Second, they all managed to get where you want to go, so you should follow their example. Especially Mary, since nobody loves God as much as she does. And because they are with God their prayers are much stronger than ours, especially Mary's. While it's absolutely true in principle that all you need is Jesus, in practice a Marian devotion is necessary for salvation simply because we have fallen so far and we need her example and intercession to get back on track. More so now than ever, especially with all the modern wealth, distractions and temptations everywhere.
>Then there's the infallibility of the pope yet popes disagree with each other/go against the bible.
The pope is infallible only in matters of faith and morals and when speaking in the capacity of teachers of the Church. This is what falls within the framework of binding and loosing of Matthew 18:18. And in this respect none have disagreed or contradicted the Bible. The pope cannot bind his successors in matters of discipline and Church administration, and thank God for that, or the Church would have accumulated centuries-worth of irrelevant cruft and bad ideas that seemed good at the time and made it a complete unruly mess.
>Also beliefs in things like purgatory which aren't in the bible seem heretical to me.
It's certainly easy to infer purgatory from the Bible. Here's a good write-up on the matter:
http://www.catholic.com/blog/tim-staples/is-purgatory-in-the-bible
You'll see it's not even very controversial when you consider what the Church actually teaches on it, and set aside all fictional accounts, artistic representation, and what critics think purgatory is.
>But Peter was chosen to be God's church and the Catholic church is a continuation of that, so are the Catholics the only real authority in Christianity?
Yes, indeed. But the Eastern Orthodox deserve an honourable mention in this regard. Their bishops are just as valid as the Catholic ones, so they are in theory capable of exercising the same authority, but because of the unfortunate circumstance of not being in communion with the Bishop of Rome they can't currently exercise this authority. Which is why they are are still stuck at the latest council at the time of the schism, the Second Council of Nicaea in AD 787. But it's going to be interesting to see if they dare attempt to define dogma in the upcoming Great and Holy Council on Crete in June.
>But if the only thing you need for salvation is Jesus, then does it matter how I worship/what church I belong to?
It's true the only thing you ultimately need is Jesus, but stop for a moment to consider what that entails. That all you need is the mere existence of Jesus would mean everyone is saved. That all you need to do is acknowledge this existence (as in "sola fide") every Christian, Muslim and even most Atheist historians would be saved. Even Satan would be saved. So this can't be the proper interpretation.
Instead you have to consider his entire ministry, that of the apostles and their successors, which is the Catholic Church. To reject the Church that Christ founded on the account that Christ is all you need doesn't make sense at all. What's more, a lot of commandments, like except you eat the flesh of the Son of man, and drink his blood, you shall not have life in you of John 6 only make sense within the context of the Church.