a layman whos raised as christian and chooses to remain as such will most read the bible and accept the whole thing as truth. however an educated christian will read the bible, sort out facts, opinions, will be able to discern what should be taken literally and what is metaphor, and will be capable of reading between the lines and having a higher understanding of the whole thing. such people tend to be shunned by the christian community.
all the books by the apostles or whatever they called themselves were selected to be canonized for the sole reason that the tended to agree with each other. there were many other books by other apostles which were intentionally left out because they tended to make hey-sus out as just another preacher rather than a devine being (and mary was no virgin either). many remaining copies of those books are kept safely hidden in the vatican vault.
