[pelagius]

Originally Posted by BarbaraGordon

Pelag, that's exactly how I felt. On the Acts matter, do we even have a solid date for the account, let alone evidence that the author actually was an "eyewitness" to the events recorded?

Here is a summary of the scholarly mainstream on authorship from the Oxford Companion to the Bible:

Authorship.
Unlike the Pauline letters, which bear the Apostle's name, the third gospel is anonymous, as are the other gospels. Ancient church tradition attributed the third gospel to the Luke who appears in Philemon 24 as Paul's “fellow worker” and is called “the beloved physician” in Collossians 4.14 (cf. 2 Tim. 4.11).

Most modern commentators on the Lucan gospel, however, are skeptical about the validity of this traditional attribution. They regard the tradition as based largely on inferences from the text of the New Testament made when people were first beginning to wonder who had written the Gospels. They further call in question Irenaeus's description of Luke as Paul's “inseparable” collaborator (Adv. haer. 3.14,1), which he inferred from the “we” sections of Acts (esp. 16.10; 20.6). The nature of these “we” sections has since been questioned. Are they fragments of a diary or notebook that the author of Acts kept as he journeyed with Paul? Or are they, rather, a literary form used by the author to enhance his narrative of sea journeys? A still larger part of the problem is the relationship of the author of Acts to Paul. In recent decades it has become evident that only with considerable difficulty can one reconcile much of the depiction of Paul in Acts with that which emerges from Paul's own letters. Hence, was the author of Luke-Acts really the “inseparable” collaborator of Paul? The difference between the Lucan Paul and the Pauline Paul is not minor; even though it is largely an issue of Acts and the Pauline letters, it bears on the authorship of the Lucan gospel. The result is that many modern commentators are uncertain about the authorship of Luke-Acts.

And here is a discussion of the date (also from the Oxford Companion to the Bible):

If the Marcan gospel is rightly included among the sources used by Luke in composing his gospel, then the latter is to be dated after Mark. The Marcan gospel is commonly dated ca. 65–70 CE. How much later is the Lucan gospel? One cannot say for certain. Luke 1.1 refers to “many” others who had previously tried to write the Jesus story; even if Mark is included among the “many,” more time must be allowed for the others to whom Luke alludes. Again, since the Lucan Jesus refers to Jerusalem as an “abandoned” house (13.35), this and other references to Jerusalem (21.20, “surrounded by camps”; 19.43–44, with earthworks erected against it) would suggest a date for Luke after the fall of Jerusalem in 70 CE. Some have sought to interpret these references as merely literary imitations of biblical descriptions of the fall of Jerusalem under Nebuchadrezzar, hence lacking in historical references to the Roman destruction. But this interpretation is not without its problems. In any case, it is widely held that the Lucan gospel was composed ca. 80–85 CE, even though one cannot maintain this dating with certainty.

Originally Posted by BarbaraGordon

The more I read the letter, the more confused I became as to what the author was trying to convey. Perhaps he can further explain himself.

The confusion is mutual.