Nothing like fixing a marriage by adopting a child.

Madonna plans on adopting three-year-old Mercy James, whom she first met when she visited Malawi. She originally scraped her year-long battle for the little girl when her marriage hit the rocks, but now that it appears like everything is back on track she is reconsidering.

Malawian adoption minister Penstone Kilembe said: “ Madonna’s’s representatives have been visiting the girl. The adoption is now advanced — all the government is waiting for is Madonna to forward the petition of adoption formalities.

“Then Mercy will be able to leave the country for a new life.”

Pals of Madonna say that she is very excited to adopt another child for their Malawian adopted son David Banda.

A close family friend revealed: “The adoption process in Malawi is so long and stressful that all the legal wrangling put a huge strain on their marriage.

“They dropped proceedings to pour all their energies into each other. But Madonna now feels they are stable enough to press ahead with the adoption again.”

The friend said Madge “fell in love” with Mercy when they met at her orphanage last year.

Unfortunately, adopting Mercy may not be as simple for Madonna as she would hope.

Mercy’s grandmother Lucy Chekechiwa, who has been asked repeatedly if an “unidentified foreign family” can adopt her, and she is firmly against it.

Speaking from her village in Zomba District, Lucy said: “We know that it is Mercy who Madonna really wants. We heard it is because my granddaughter is such a beautiful, happy child.

The child has been living in an orphanage since her birth mother died during child-birth. When the child is old enough, her family would like her back.

Lucy said, “When Mercy is no longer a baby we want her back. I do not want the money they said they’d give me.”

“Twice I have told the adoption people that I do not want Mercy to go outside the country.

“But they keep on at us. Now they say that Mercy will be leaving us, but can return at age 18. Yet I might not be alive then.”

Tough situation. Should the child be sent across the country with strangers who have the money to take proper care of her or stay in her country’s orphanage with frequent visits from her family members who seem truly determined to get enough money bring her home?