Ward-Green-Takahashi (WGT) identities play a crucial role in hadron physics, e.g. imposing stringent relationships between the kernels of the one-and two-body problems, which must be preserved in any veracious treatment of mesons as bound-states. In this connection, one may view the dressed gluon-quark vertex, Γ a µ , as fundamental. We use a novel representation of Γ a µ , in terms of the gluon-quark scattering matrix, to develop a method capable of elucidating the unique quarkantiquark Bethe-Salpeter kernel, K , that is symmetry-consistent with a given quark gap equation.A strength of the scheme is its ability to expose and capitalise on graphic symmetries within the kernels. This is displayed in an analysis that reveals the origin of H-diagrams in K , which are twoparticle-irreducible contributions, generated as two-loop diagrams involving the three-gluon vertex, that cannot be absorbed as a dressing of Γ a µ in a Bethe-Salpeter kernel nor expressed as a member of the class of crossed-box diagrams. Thus, there are no general circumstances under which the WGT identities essential for a valid description of mesons can be preserved by a Bethe-Salpeter kernel obtained simply by dressing both gluon-quark vertices in a ladder-like truncation; and, moreover, adding any number of similarly-dressed crossed-box diagrams cannot improve the situation.