We have not been allowed to ruin the Church.

It is doubtful whether at any time since Pentecost all professing Christians have formed one visibly united body; the divisions, which Saint Paul deplored at Corinth continued to be manifest, sometimes for causes that were genuinely theological, often for motives of mere personal rivalry, and almost always for a variety of reasons that were neither entirely creditable nor the reverse. The ideal of one Church is noble and inspiring. But nearly 2000 years of Christian history should at least raise a doubt whether Providence intends such unity to be expressed on the plane of outward institutions; whether the church is not meant to grow like a human body, by reduplication of separate individual cells, rather than by mere extension of an undifferentiated mass; whether the bond of mutual charity is not preferable to the fetter of uniformity.

G.S.M. Walker, in The Growing Storm: Sketches of Church History from A.D. 600 to A.D. 1350.