Actually, no. I don't believe in sola scriptura either. That's mainly an evangelical/fundamentalism belief also practiced within mainline Protestantism. Given how they have treated the GLBT community as a whole, I have no love for those beliefs either. The bible is not infallible. Many mainline Protestants believe in sola scriptura but a few denominations had taken aspects of Catholicism with them. Namely, the Anglicans and Lutherans both practice the Eurcharist.
So I asked myself this. Why were only certain books (writings over a period of time) accepted to be part of the makeup of the Bible, yet other books, which are in the Vatican library, not included? Why do Catholics retain within their bibles books which have been rejected by Protestants as heretical but as canon by the Catholic Church? Why are there so many Christian denominations, denominations that read the same bible, by the way, but they cannot agree on interpretation?
When I began to see how Christians couldn't agree on interpretation, condemning one another as heretical because of sola scriptura or tradition, I found myself wanting to breakaway from all that mess. In my search I was becoming more spiritual in my beliefs but retained the only two tenents that encompass all of what I was finding on my journey; love God and loving one another. Nothing else mattered. Tradition didn't matter. Trying to figure out the book of Revelation didn't matter. I was in the here and now. And I wanted to make a difference in my life and with others with God himself guiding my life and not have the trappings of organized religion.
If there are people that are happy within organized religion, I'm happy for them. It's not for me.
First we have to define what "canon" is: the term means a rule or measure. So what was the rule? It was simple: what is read in the churches. What we now call the canon began with individual churches/congregations writing to each other and saying, "These are the books we read in church during worship; what do you read?" And if the second church didn't have all the ones the first church listed, they'd ask for copies, and if they had some they read in church that the first didn't list, they'd send copies along. It didn't take long before all the churches within a couple of days' travel had the same lists, and when they got together to discuss issues -- what came to be called "councils" -- they'd repeat the process, sending their list over to other churches that met in their own local area councils. Before the end of the second century the lists were virtually identical everywhere, but regional councils were still comparing lists, and by the end of the third century the process had gotten up to the councils held by the various patriarchs.
So when Athanasius and others sent out their lists of what was being read for worship in their churches, they weren't issuing decrees to be followed, they were issuing lists that met the measure of "what is read in the churches" -- the decision of what was recognized didn't come from the top down but from the bottom up, and the level of agreement between churches across the Roman Empire and outside it as well was pretty amazing; the Hebrew scriptures were accepted unanimously, along with all but seven of the New Testament books. Those seven, noted as "spoken against" because some (or many) churches didn't approve them, were included as being read in the churches, but they were kept on a distinct second level, and that level came with a restriction: no doctrine was to be founded on those books; they could only be used to support doctrine founded on the undisputed books. The same was true of the "Old Testament" books that had been originally written in Greek; they were read in the churches, but not to be used to establish doctrine, only to support what the unanimously-approved books taught. And those Old Testament books written originally in Greek are what have come to be called "Apocrypha" by many, or "Deuterocanonical", meaning "second canon".
And there's a huge divide between churches who do you all those books in church and those who don't: those who do turn out to be the ones who, as you say, "practice the Eucharist". They also tend to be the ones who honor the church Fathers, which is a no-brainer for anyone who reads the New Testament and actually pays attention: Jesus promised that the Holy Spirit would lead the apostles into "all truth", and Paul explained that the Spirit gives teachers to the church -- apparently giving the means through which the promise Jesus gave takes place. So who are those teachers sent by the Spirit to expound truth? That's a question the radical Reformation as well as most Calvinists can't give an answer to, since in practice they operate as though Jesus never made such a promise and the Spirit never did what Paul epxlained (or they point to the people who founded their denomination as the fulfillment, ignoring the fact that this must mean that the promises weren't acted on for most of church history!).
That divide shows up in how the different groups treat the term "sola scriptura": those who essentially ignore the Fathers treat it as meaning that the scriptures are the only source needed for understanding theology -- epitomized by the ludicrous "King James Only" movement that teats that one translation as though it was the inspired word, and that no one needs to read any other book at all! But Lutherans and Anglicans understand that "sola scriptura" isn't the answer to "What's the only thing I need to read?" but to the question "What is the final authority in matters theological?"
It's not hard to guess that the astoundingly vast numbers of denominations and sects (and cults) that go their own way and disagree with everyone else come from those who hold to the first treatment of "sola scriptura", a meaning that, if the Reformers had meant it, would have been termed "nuda scriptura", "naked scripture". Since they have in essence rejected the promise of Jesus and the teaching of Paul concerning the action of the Holy Spirit in leading the church universal into truth, they are left with no authority but their own imaginations -- as one Orthodox observer noted, "each leader their own little pope" (and as another Orthodox observer pointed out, the explosion of sects is the fruit of the seed Rome planted", since Rome was the first to assert that all truth came from them). If they don't acknowledge the handful of fully ecumenical councils and don't honor the Fathers, they have no anchor.
And the way Jesus spoke that promise points to why the heirs of the radical Reformation are without an anchor: it isn't a promise to "you", singular -- as just about every one of those sects treats it -- it was a promise to "you" plural ("y'all", for students of New Testament Greek), a promise not to the apostles as individuals but to them jointly as the leaders of the church... not just part of the church, but all of it. And the conditions for that haven't been met since the Council of Chalcedon in 451 A.D., when due more to politics than to a desire for the truth much of the church (now referred to as oriental Orthodox and known as miaphysites) was kicked out of fellowship by the leadership of the church in the Roman Empire. So until all those who honor the Fathers -- who are the ones who "practice the Eucharist" -- get together as equals, the only fulfillment of that promise that we have is found in the early councils and the Fathers.
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BTW, the book called "Revelations" was the lowest on the 'totem pole' of what was read in the churches, since it was objected to on multiple grounds: its authorship was uncertain (the majority held it to be by a different John, John the Elder rather than John the Apostle), its message unclear (not a solid witness to the Gospel, plus hard as heck to understand), and its usefulness in edification (i.e. building a spiritual life) was dubious. I agree with Martin Luther concerning it, that until a Christian has a firm grasp on the Gospels, Paul's letters to the Romans and to the Galatians, Genesis, and the Psalms, "Revelations" should stay closed.
As for being "happy with organized religion", the apostle does admonish us to not forsake gathering with the fellowship of the saints, which essentially boils down to church on Sunday. Being happy with the organized part isn't required, though; I know a number of Christians whose attitude toward organized religion is amusement, but they attend because worship together with others is beneficial to spiritual life.
