I would disagree profoundly with your summation of the events. But that illustrates the point I was making earlier. Banding together for the sake of one's physical presence is one thing. Banding together for the sake of unity despite message is Apostacy. The message invariably is tainted and the outcome is teaching a lie for the sake of harmony. If we're gonna resort to that, then why pretend at Christianity or that Christ has any efficacy. When the message is turned into assent for a lie, you've nullified Christ's worth and the covenant with it. In the doing, you've said the enemy was right all along. These are natural consequences that cannot be avoided, skirted or danced around with semantics. Many try endlessly. And shining the light of truth in on the semantics generally tends to divide, not unite. Which is why many of these groups are not unified to begin with.
"Many of these groups"?
I am speaking of the divided wings of Catholicism: Roman and Orthodox.
What are the basics of the message: "Love your neighbor as you love yourself, and love God above all." Jesus said that these two Commandments were the ENTIRETY of The Law and the Prophets. In other words, on God's authority you may now fold shut your Old Testament and read those two commandments over and over again, because God has told you EXACTLY what GOD inspired in the Old Testament. The rest is detail, and it can confuse people. It can actually lead people AWAY from God's Two Commandments, if they read into the Old Testament MORE than the Two Commandments that God Incarnate said were the ENTIRETY of the Old Testament.
Any disagreement on that?
If there is, then you've gone off the message of Jesus.
Says who?
HIM!
So, that's the whole Law and Prophets, the whole OT, according to God: "Love your neighbor as yourself, and love God above all." He gave some specifics about HOW to love your neighbor as yourself: practice charity, tell the truth, do not gossip, be meek and avoid violence.
Got it.
Now, what else did God say in the New?
Well, he gave us a Church, and he left it under leaders with the power "to loose and to bind". And THEY told us to lay on hands to impart the Holy Spirit (Confirmation) and how to select the clergy and lay hands on them (Ordination).
Jesus told us to baptize, and did it himself (Baptism).
Jesus healed the sick through prayer and told his followers to do so (Anointing of the sick)
Jesus and his apostles called for the repentance of sin (Penance).
Jesus performed his first miracle at a wedding in Cana, and he told us marriage is holy and made by God (Marriage), and not to break what God has made.
And finally, Jesus told us to break the bread and take the cup in memory of him (the Eucharist).
Got it.
Seven sacraments and two commandments.
That's it.
That's the message.
There isn't anything more to it than that.
The rest is detail, and the details are not sufficient to keep us separate.
Oh, and he also specifically said, when his apostles were trying to stop others preaching and casting out demons in his name, not to stop them, because "Those who are not against us are with us."
Nothing about this is hard to understand, although much of it is quite hard to actually DO. Especially the part about being nice to others.
What do YOU think are the vital parts of Jesus' message that force us to reject each other and not walk together all the way to St. Peter's gate?