Christ was born in Bethlehem. Now he’s everywhere.

Even those who try to ignore him can’t. Consider all the ways people try to avoid mentioning him, and fail.

“Happy holidays!” Holidays, of course, is simply a shortened form of the phrase “holy days.”  And so, in December, Happy Holidays means not just Merry Christmas, it refers to all the big celebrations on the Church calendar: Happy feast of the Immaculate Conception, Patroness of the United States! Happy feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe, Patroness of the Americas!

“Happy holidays” also means: Have a blessed feast of the Holy Innocents! Enjoy your St. John the Evangelist Day wine! May you grow in your faith this Solemnity of Mary the Mother of God, feast of the Holy Family, Epiphany and Baptism of Jesus!

“Season’s greetings!” There are two special seasons in December worth special greetings: The Advent season and the Christmas season. We know that Christmas cards often go out very early, and they can arrive in the middle of the season of Advent. We can thank the sender of this message for their kind words of encouragement for our Advent hope, our Christmas joy — or both.

“Peace on earth.” These words are another greeting often found on cards at this time of year, apart from any mention of Christmas. But we know the source of that message. It’s the same message the angels brought to the shepherds when Christ was first born. A December card proclaiming peace on earth is acknowledging that the only peace on earth will come through Christ the King.

“Love is the gift of the season.” The themes of love and gift giving also teach an important Christmas lesson. Even if the giver of such a card is squeamish about identifying Jesus, he or she still insists that there is something unique and significant about this time of year. But the only reason gifts and love are a focus, of course, is that this is the time of year we acknowledge the birth of the Son of God, who is love.

Lights, evergreens and ornaments. Pictures of strings of lights remind us that Christ is the light of the world. Ball ornaments remind us that he has showered our human nature with beautiful blessings. And evergreen branches remind us that Christ’s life is always fresh and new.

You can even find Christ when he is conspicuously absent.

Winter scene. Many Christmas cards show a winter scene with animals or a peaceful countryside and a cozy house. Now, it’s an open secret that the people who send such a card would never send a random card to acknowledge another season — even though the other seasons are much more worth celebrating. They don’t send a card to acknowledge spring flowers, or one to celebrate summer fun, or a fall card to mark the changing of the leaves and the new school year. They send a winter card because the proximity of Christ’s birth, and that alone, makes winter festive.

Happy hearth. Another recurring theme in Christmas cards shows a happy home and perhaps a Yule log. These are celebrations of family, which as we know it is a Judeo-Christian concept. Christians ended the pagan practice of exposing infants, insisted on monogamy and raised the status of women — making home scenes cheery instead of scary.

New Year’s greetings. Some opt to celebrate the New Year. These cards are stuck with the fact that they are celebrating a calendar created by a Pope and hailing a new year that is timed to be associated with Christ’s birthday. And the most secular cards serve as nice reminders that there’s still an urgent need for us to introduce more of the world to Christ!

So, we love all the ways people say “Merry Christmas” to us, and we are grateful that these reminders are still so vital a part of our culture, though we don’t think people should be so squeamish about acknowledging why they are part of our culture.

We do understand the fear to proclaim Christ, however. As Pope Benedict XVI explained in his inaugural homily, we all have a touch of that phobia.

“If we let Christ enter fully into our lives, if we open ourselves totally to him, are we not afraid that he might take something away from us?” he said. “Are we not perhaps afraid to give up something significant, something unique, something that makes life so beautiful? Do we not then risk ending up diminished and deprived of our freedom?”

But he explained that we needn’t fear after all.

“If we let Christ into our lives,” said the Holy Father, “we lose nothing, nothing, absolutely nothing of what makes life free, beautiful and great. No! Only in this friendship are the doors of life opened wide.”

And that is why we at the Register will wish you an unabashed “Merry Christmas,” and encourage others to do the same. The more we insist that there’s no shame in mentioning Christ’s name, the more we’ll guarantee that he will always be impossible to ignore.