I have had situations in the past with some of my friends who were Catholics similar to this scenario, but

more on the side of traditions and papal authority than on laymen studying the bible on their own and falling into heresies...but to me, my answer to that sort of question or comment would fall under the same support within the Word of God. The first passage that came to my mind was the passage that discussed that the Bereans searched the Scriptures daily to see if the things that Paul was teaching were in line with the truth of the Old Testament (Acts 17:11). This proves that men should not take every word from the mouth of another man as truth unless it is proved to be true from the Scriptures itself, unless the man is Jesus himself. It did not matter if it was the apostle Paul, the best of men will be men at best; we all sin and fall short of God's holy standard (Romans 3:23; Romans 7). Yes, God has established pastors and teachers to teach the bible to humankind, and yes, God has decided to use the avenue of humans to relay his message to all peoples, but we cannot underestimate our sinful flesh that battles against the Holy Spirit that has taken up residence within us by Jesus. Romans 3:10-12 states, "As it is written, there is none righteous, no, not one :There is none that understandeth, there is none that seeketh after God. They are all gone out of the way, they are together become unprofitable; there is none that doeth good, no, not one." Within our flesh "dwelleth no good thing" as Romans 7:18 states, and according to John 15:5 Jesus states, "without me ye can do nothing." We are totally in need of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, and our effectiveness and accurateness is in direct relationship to our dependence upon him, not dependence upon church leaders or church authority. The more we are dependent upon the Lord, the more godly we will be. The more we submit every area of our lives to the Lord, the more he can use us to accomplish his will. Jesus gave us the Holy Spirit so that he can teach us the things of God through him, and that is why 1 Corinthians 2:10-13 states, "But God hath revealed them unto us by his Spirit: for the Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God. For what man knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of man which is in him? even so the things of God knoweth no man, but the Spirit of God. Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the spirit which is of God; that we might know the things that are freely given to us of God. Which things also we speak, not in the words which man's wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost teacheth; comparing spiritual things with spiritual."