Ecclesia semper reformanda est

Ecclesia semper reformanda est (Latin for "the church must always be reformed", often - as usual in Latin - shortened to Ecclesia semper reformanda) is a phrase first used by Karl Barth in 1947, allegedly deriving from a saying of St. Augustine. It refers to the conviction of certain Reformed Protestant theologians that the church must continually re-examine itself in order to maintain its purity of doctrine and practice. An early example is Jodocus van Lodenstein, Beschouwinge van Zion (Contemplation of Zion), Amsterdam, 1674-1678, who claims the "truth [...] that also in the Church there is always much to reform" ("Sekerlijk de Gereformeerde Waarheyd [...] leert dat in de Kerke ook altijd veel te herstellen is").

A variation of the term, Ecclesia reformata semper reformanda ("the reformed church [must] always be reformed"), also used by Karl Barth, refers to the desire of an "erudite man" cited by Jodocus van Lodenstein that the Church should not be called "Reformata", but "Reformanda". It is widely but informally used in Reformed and Presbyterian churches today (for example, the French Reformed Church use "Ecclesia reformata, semper reformanda" as motto).

The first term was used by Hans Küng and other ecclesiastical reformers of the Roman Catholic Church who were caught up in the spirit of Vatican II of the 1960s. This latter usage appears in a 2009 pastoral letter by bishop R. Walker Nickless that encourages a hermeneutic of continuity in Catholic teaching and practice.

The phrase (without the est) is also put into the mouth of the fictional Pope Gelasius III in Mary Doria Russell's 1998 novel Children of God.

Emidio. Campi, "Ecclesia semper reformanda". Metamorphosen einer altehrwürdigen Formel, in Zwingliana 39 (2010), 1-17.

...
Wikipedia