Well, here's an off-the-cuff response from a non-elder, so take it with a grain of salt:
I think Rome is being a bit hypocritical. She likes to set "the Fathers" and "the tradition" up as some authority to which she adheres and in which she stands. But really, even a cursory reading of church history (whether its church discipline, Christology, grace & the will, iconoclasts and image-proponents, etc.) shows that the fathers didn't always agree with themselves. Different provincial councils disagreed with one another as well. They were still disagreeing during Charlemagne's reign, with debates over the nature of the presence in the Lord's Supper, predestination and grace, etc. And a few centuries later, you have different schools of Scholastics disagreeing with one another.
When I started reading Reformation and later Protestant literature a couple years ago, I was struck by just how intimately acquainted these men were with church history. Calvin, Turretin, William Whitaker, etc., all of their knowledge of patristics and medieval theology would put ours to shame. And, speaking loosely, it did indeed seem that they used them as interpretive tools, but not as a final authority.
I would say that we, as Protestants, think that there is a real, objective meaning in the Scripture that can be ascertained through diligent study, even if the noetic effects of sin and the limitations of our minds prevent full agreement on some issues. And we hold the tradition of the church up against the standard of Scripture.
Rome holds out Scripture in the one hand, and Tradition in the other, and asks, "What will you do without me to interpret all of this for you?" Because when they speak of tradition as authority, they are really speaking of the particular strands of tradition, made up from a variety of theologians, councils, and outright myths, that Rome approves of and places her seal on. Even Rome doesn't agree with all "tradition."
So she's really asking how we're going to get along without Her? And I would just say, "We're getting along fine."
