In the major book of Rav Nahman there is brought the fact that most religious leaders are demonic Torah scholars. That is in the LeM I1:2 and I:28. But this sort of problem has been around longer.

In the Five Books of Moses we find that Korah had a bunch of people with him [250] that were against Moses.  The Midrash says those people were the heads of the sanhedrins. [I mean to say that Moses had picked out judges to provide for small courts and larger courts of appeal. These very same people were the ones that later went against Moses.

I do would not trust religious authorities if they told me the sky is blue.

Nowadays if you want to know what the Torah requires of you there the best way of finding a good Litvak yeshiva based on the Gra and Rav Shach and sitting and learning there for a few years. There is a somewhat shorter approach by getting the basic set of Musar books [Ethics] from the Middle Ages plus learning the Tur with the Beit Yoseph and Bach. [The Tur was the son of the Rosh. His is the best book on law that I know of. It certainly helped me gain clarity about scores of issues.]