Mora...what?

Yesterday, Jeremy and I sat at our dinner table discussing the adoption update we recieved earlier in the day.  Neither of us really understood the verbage that was used and didn't really know what it meant....
Of course I couldn't hardly make it through dinner without knowing what this word "moratorium" meant so I pulled out our IPad and googled it...

Merriam-Webster Dictionary said: a legally authorized period of delay: a suspension of activity.

What? That can't be happening in our adoption timeline.  We are just getting settled in this process and we were really hoping that we would at least have some movement by the end of the year.  So we had to take a deep breath and do a little research.  Here is what I found.

The Russian Foreign Ministry(people responsible for adoptions)have suggested the government employ a suspension on US adoptions of Russina children - It is my understanding this is mostly due to a couple of cases in the US where adopted Russian children have been abused and the Russian officials feel like the US judicial system has not given severe enough concequences.
Luckily the Foreign Ministry is not able to employ this moratorium on their own, this must go through the Russian government and they must sign an addendum to the US/Russian Adoption agreement that was signed into place in the summer of 2011. 

So if you are a praying person, we ask that you pray that GOD releases this suggestion or that the Russian government sees that there is a huge need to continue to find the 250,000 orphans a home.  The financial cost to keep these children institutionalized must be huge.  The percentage of children that grow up in an orphanage and exit at an appropriate age to the "real" world and are actually are sucessful is very low.  Most of these kids end up involved with drugs, alcohol, prostitution, in jail or worse commit suicide.  These are all children of God that end up lost, and maybe could have been guided and loved by a forever family. We pray that the lack of self control from another adoptive family will not impact our family.  I feel like a child right now saying to my mom, that just because someone else did something wrong doesn't mean I should be punished.  Funny thing about that is that my mother would gently respond with - sometimes life's just not fair...

We have built a dream around our Snow Princess.  We have started getting connected with other Russian adoptive families, familarlized ourselves with the culture and country, prayed for this child daily and even bought winter coats on sale that will keep us warm in tempatures that extend to -9 degrees.   We are saddened that the program maybe put on hold, but we are hopeful that this won't happen.  We are not interested at this time of switching countries.  So we just have a worry in our hearts, but hopefull that things will continue to move as usual.

At this time - Nothing has changed....adoptions are still proceeding as they have.........we will pray it stays this way.