It is quite well understood that the Catholics to pray to any saint are expecting the saint to pray for them to God, not worshiping them, just honoring the idea that the saints are now with of God and will ask in their behalf. That is not worship! A big difference!
It’s quite well understood by Catholics. Outside the RCC, it’s not infrequently misunderstood or deliberately misrepresented.
The whole “misunderstanding” is based on the word “worship”
If I set up a shrine, kneel and pray to my father (If there is such a thing as a saint, he would qualify) to intercede on my behalf with God , I am worshiping him.
Teenagers worship rock stars. They scream and faint for them.
During the campaign, many people worshipped Obama to the consternation of many conservatives. Obamamania. No one worshipped McCain.
I can’t believe too many non-Catholic Christians believe Catholics actually believe Mary has autonomous powers of intervention.
No you’re not.
Only metaphorically.
Debateable. They certainly worshipped Palin (and still do).
Then you haven’t talked to enough non-Catholic Christians. Seriously. I have had the *personal experience *of explaining to people (in my case, IIRC, conservative Lutherans) that no, Catholics *don’t *actually think that the Saints are the ones doing the heavy lifting.
Part of the problem lies in the fact that official Catholic doctrine is one thing and folk Catholicism as practiced by many Catholics is another. I’m married into a Ukranian Catholic family that is heavily folk-Catholic (my wife isn’t but her family is), and what they actually believe bears only a surface resemblence to official Catholic doctrine.
For example, look at “Marianism”. The official Catholic church has a very elaborate theology of Mary: Alliance of the Hearts of Jesus and Mary - Wikipedia
… but to some folk Catholics, this doesn’t go nearly far enough. What they do is, to all intents and purposes, worship Mary as a goddess in her own right. She grants visions, dispenses favours and miracles, and commands them (through visions) to do stuff. How is that not a goddess? Sure, the Church may have an explaination for how really it is all the one god (who is three) who is doing it all, but you will never hear a peep about that from these folk believers, who are in any case profoundly skeptical of the Church hierarchy.
Now, I myself couldn’t care less whether they are monotheistic or polytheistic - makes no difference to me, who am neither. But an outside observer listening tio them and seeing what they themselves believed, would be hard pressed to say objectively that they don’t worship Mary in the sense of worshipping her as a divine being in her own right.
If you look at a picture of your father, or a statue of him and you ask your father to pray to God for you, you are not worshipping your father, you are asking your father to intercede for you. Not giving your father the power of God and not worshipping him! You are not talking to the statue or picture, but your picture helps you to remember your father, No sane person would ask a picture or a statue to pray for them, The saints are supposed to be someone who is with God and can intercede with God for the person’s benefit.
I personally do not believe if there is a supreme being who is a loving father, he doesn’t need anyone to pray to Him, or have need of worship, unless he plays games and is an egotist!! A good father would not need his children to beg for necessities or would the Good father give the child any thing that would be harmful to the child, in a human’s case they do not know for certain what a child needs for sure, so the child must make it’s needs known.
I guess they didn’t worship McCain, but worship Palin in that sense?