41 years from now will be the thousandth anniversary of the Great (or East-West) Schism, specifically dating it from when the Catholic Pope and the Patriarch of Constantinople mutually excommunicated each other. This was the first great split in Christianity, and it permanently cemented the divide between Western and Eastern Europe. But what if it had been averted?
The Schism was the culmination of centuries of cultural tension between east and west, which is difficult to change. Let's just say, for the purposes of the thought experiment, that cooler heads prevailed and the church managed to stay united, at least for significantly longer than OTL. How would this change the trajectory of history?
Some possibilities:
-Could the Byzantines have held out longer against the Turks with more Catholic support?
-How would this affect the eventual wave of reformers? The Lollards, the Hussites, and the Protestants all had nearly identical criticisms of the Church, so it's likely that even with butterflies there would still be very similar movements that spring up. Would the Church possibly change its direction enough that the same criticisms wouldn't be made? Or even if the Church developed the same, and movements sprung up with those criticisms, would the Catholicism of the East be relevant to that? Would such movements perhaps be more likely to spring up in the East?