I didn't claim that proximity guarantees correct thinking. But if we are trying to determinine what the early Church thought, there is no better way than reading (in addition to reading the writings of the Apostles) the fathers. Otherwise, why read the New Testament? We read the NT and treat it as authoritative precisely because it comes ultimately from the Apostles, who were appointed and entrusted with the authority to represent Christ. Their credibility as representatives of what Christ taught follows mostly from their proximity to Christ. That is true even if proximity is not a guarantee of correct thinking. Protestants cannot explain the fact that the early Church, spread all over the known world, held to the same Catholic faith. The best explanation for that fact is that the content of that faith had a common origin, i.e. in the Apostles. There was no church that said, "Hey, we had an Apostle come through here and preach to us, but he never said anything about bishops, or ordained a bishop for us." Everywhere the Apostles went they ordained bishops to lead the churches over which they were appointed. But Protestants (except Anglicans, and some Methodists) reject episcopal authority.
-A8