The Mater Ecclesiae Fund for Vocations has structured the St. John Vianney Student Debt Relief Grant program to be neutral to the discernment process.
The first way we do this, is to require that a grant applicant have a letter of acceptance before he can submit an application for a grant. For a man called to the diocesan priesthood, this letter must be from his bishop and it must identify which of the approved seminaries he will be attending for his formation. For a man called to religious life, it must be a letter of acceptance from an approved religious institute.
Requiring the candiate to be accepted for formation serves to focus the his attention on the discernment of his vocation with the aid of his vocation director, rather than on the issue of his debt.
Once a grant is approved, the manner in which grant payments are made furthers the goal of discernment neutrality. Grant payouts are made according to the normal monthly payment schedule of the loans to the financial institutions that hold the grant recipient's loans.
By making payments over time, rather a lump-sum payout, we avoid two possibilities for influence on the discernment process:
Prospective applicants should read all the pages available under the menu items "Grant Programs" and "For Applicants" to fully inform themselves about the requirements for application.