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The 35,000 hosts sent by the Archdiocese of Panama arrived in Havana, where they were received by Mother Prioress Tereza de Jesús Misericordioso from the Monastery of Discalced Carmelites Santa Teresa, as confirmed by the Archdiocese of Panama on their official account.
The donation, carefully prepared by the Sisters of the Monastery of the Visitation of Panama and transported by COPA Airlines in four boxes marked as fragile, was addressed to the Medalla Milagrosa Parish in Centro Habana, for the attention of Father José M. Reyes.
The Panamanian Archdiocese expressed its gratitude to Archbishop José Domingo Ulloa Mendieta, the Sisters of the Visitation, and the airline, describing the gesture as "a sign of communion and brotherhood among sister churches."
"May this gesture strengthen the faith, hope, and unity of the Church," noted the Archdiocese in its publication.
The shipment responds to an unprecedented crisis in the production of wafers in Cuba: on June 4th, the Discalced Carmelite nuns of the Monastery of Santa Teresa and San José in El Vedado —the only supplier of wafers for all the Catholic churches in the country— announced a halt in their production due to a lack of electricity.
With only two hours of power a day, the industrial mixer and the mechanical press needed to produce the wafers cannot operate.
"We inform you that, due to the lack of electricity, it is impossible for us to prepare the communion wafers," the nuns warned in a statement circulated among the Cuban clergy, adding that "the remaining supply will be rationed to ensure it lasts a bit for everyone."
The Dominican priest George Payano explained to the AFP agency the extent of the problem: "The Carmelite sisters produce the hosts for all of Cuba. They need time and need to move the machinery, the press for that… Two hours of electricity is very limited."
This is the second time in less than five years that the monastery has halted its production: in November 2022, the cause was a lack of flour.
According to a documentary filmed in 2017, the monastery produced up to 1,000,000 host wafers monthly.
The international response was immediate and on a large scale.
In addition to the Panamanian donation, the Archdiocese of San Juan de Puerto Rico mobilized nearly 300,000 Eucharistic forms for Cuba, many of which were prepared by the Dominican Sisters of the Cloister of the Mother of God Monastery in Manatí, and are personally received by Cardinal Juan de la Caridad García Rodríguez, Archbishop of Havana.
In total, more than 335,000 hosts have arrived or are on their way to Cuba from sister churches in both countries.
The electrical collapse that led to this crisis is structural. The Electric Union reported on June 16 a capacity of only 995 MW against a demand of 2,620 MW, with a power deficit that exceeded 2,100 MW at its worst. Power outages in some areas reach 20 to 24 hours daily.
The president of the Conference of Catholic Bishops of Cuba, Monsignor Arturo González Amador, described the situation in May 2026 as "the most difficult and saddest moment in the history of my people that I am aware of."
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