Jan. 1 (Bloomberg) — The Obama administration was temporarily blocked by a U.S. Supreme Court justice from forcing an order of Catholic nuns to comply with a federal requirement to provide free contraceptive coverage for employees.

Justice Sonia Sotomayor's two-sentence order will last at least until Jan. 3, the deadline she gave the administration to respond to a bid by the Denver and Baltimore chapters of the Little Sisters of the Poor for an exemption to the mandate. The Supreme Court released the order last night, a half hour before the mandate took effect.

The Obama administration, on the first day that health care policies took effect under the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, is confident its final rules strike the needed balance of providing women with free contraceptive coverage while preventing non-profit religious employers from having to provide the coverage, said an administration official who wasn't authorized to speak on the record.