How is communion wafer made and where is it made?
A lot of different companies make communion wafers. If you google ‘church supplies’ you can find a number of companies who produce these. Most of these though are produced in a modern method by machine where the little wafers are stamped out and dried before being packaged into large plastic containers and sent to churches. Most church based stores such as LifeWay, Cokesbury, Augsburg Fortress etc. will carry in them containers of communion wafers usually holding 750 – 1000 per box. That is how many are made now. Traditionally, communion wafers were made by nuns. The process was fairly simple. A dough would be made of wheat flour and water. It would then be rolled out into very thin sheets. The maker would then take either a hot iron or a stamp a clamp it down on the dough. This would cut the wafers into their round shapes – sometimes with designs added to the host – and also dry our the dough or essentially toast it. What you have left is the traditional little round wafer that were u
The traditional communion wafers served during Roman Catholic communion services are made out of two ingredients, wheat flour and water. In fact, during the earliest years of the Christian church, there was an entire ritual surrounding the process of creating communion wafers, beginning with the selection and cleansing of the wheat. Once the wheat had been properly washed and ground, only a baker sanctioned by the local church council could produce communion wafers in a ceremonially shielded iron-plated oven. Eventually, certain orders of nuns assumed the responsibility of creating communion wafers, which often became a source of income for their convents. The standard ingredients still remained wheat flour and water, with no seasoning or leavening permitted. Modern communion wafers may be embossed with religious symbols or perforated for easier dispensation. The priests who serve holy communion may have to consume larger communion wafers, also called hosts, than those placed on the to
