Many years ago I made a good faith effort to understand the "iota's worth of difference" in these ancient theological debates, but just couldn't. So I concluded that if I can't understand it, then 99% of people couldn't understand it, and that therefore, it cannot be a matter of ANY importance to either God or Christ Himself.
So I'm not saying that one side is right theologically and the other side wrong. What I am saying is that the Council of Chalcedon redefined the divinity of Christ in such a way that Copts and others could not accept it. Then, using the state power of the Eastern Roman Empire, the Orthodox declared Copts (and others) to be heretics deserving persecution.
In my mind, such processes, and related ones repeated innumerable times throughout the following 1,000+ years, are morally wrong in the utmost extreme.
So, let's consider a modern analogy, one where the argument clearly favors the Church: post-war, post-Holocaust, Catholic Church declarations that anti-Semitism, as it was taught for many centuries, is now to be considered morally unacceptable. Good for the Church -- about time that issue was corrected. But what about those who refuse to change? Are they now suddenly heretics?
Yes, if their hearts are full of hatred for Jews. But what if they are not? What if they are simply driven by an unquenchable love for the Church as they used to know it?
All I'm saying is a little bit of Christian love ought to be extended on both sides, and serious efforts made to overcome obstacles.
Such efforts were never, to my knowledge, made regarding ancient Copts or any number of others declared, for whatever reasons, "heretical."