There is something else we can learn from the RC view of church - it is a corporate image. While we do not accept that the 'tradition' of the church trumps what the Bible teaches, there can be dangers lurking in the Protestant view too.
When we talk about Sola Scriptura (Scripture alone) we do not mean (likewise as the Reformers did not mean) that my personal interpretation of the Bible trumps everything else. We come together as a body of believers and we study the Bible together.
We are proud of our Protestant heritage and quick to reject anything 'just because the church / tradition says so'. That is good and we must always go back to God's Word to see what that says... but did you notice the 'we' in the above paragraph?
It is a little too easy for Protestants to ape the individualism so prevalent in our society. We turn up at church and the Vicar says something we don't like, but that's okay because I don't think the Bible says that. I just accept the bits I agree with. I go home. Watch TV. End of.
This explains why PBC places such an emphasis on sermons and Bible study groups. These are deliberately corporate experiences (e.g. morning tea and pm supper) so that we have our own personal interpretations of the Bible challenged by others. We all have blind spots and church is the place where we help one another to follow God together - this is just as true for myself and Tim as for anyone else.
Of course, all this assumes that when we meet together we do so with the aim of getting to know God's Word better (in the Bible) so that we can better follow Him.
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