When Gozo Bishop Mario Grech decides to announce that "a family is a relationship between man and woman, based on marriage" - automatically disqualifying other unions from making the grade - I do not bat an eyelid.

Eighty per cent of Facebook is currently throwing a good, old-fashioned hissy fit. As for me, he might as well have finished his statement with "in other news, water is wet and fire is hot".

Do not get me wrong: I am most definitely in favour of a discrimination-free society and you certainly won't find me trying to interfere in the private lives of others. If two individuals want to get married, it's no-one else's business but theirs and their gender has no bearing on this.

However, I can't really criticise the bishop for expressing his own personal belief, despite the fact that I strongly disagree with said belief.

Freedom of expression applies to everyone, including church officials. If none of you can see why it is imperative that it be so, then you really are not in a position to blab on about discrimination and the like.

However, my support for the Gozo bishop ends there. This right to freedom of speech does not include the right to expect that the state impose your religious beliefs on the whole country, with complete disregard towards the rights of those who do not share these beliefs.

I can understand an exhortation aimed towards the flock. But please, do not try to pull the wool over our eyes by claiming that this definition of family is a sociological one as opposed to a religious one. A quick look around you will show you that the opposite is true. I'd love to hear any priest attempt to explain to the two women who have been raising a child for these past ten years why they are not a family. Worse still, go explain it to the child.

Based in reason my foot.

So yes, remind the flock about the catholic meaning of family by all means. But please do leave the State out of it. The people can see the church's demands for government policy that only favours the catholic definition of marriage for what it is.

A demand to discriminate against everyone else.