Worship-venerate, you are dealing with a VERY FINE LINE there that no Protestant would get near!
When Cortez set up a statue, of what they considered to be Mary, between the Aztec gods, and fell down before it, did the pagans know the difference between the Aztec worshiping of the stone gods of Tezcatlipoca and Huitzilopochtli, and the veneration of a statue of Mary by the Spaniards?
No, to them it looked the same.
What the HELL are you talking about???
Actually, Ruy, you've brought up an interesting and important consideration. And that is, how do we understand, and help others to understand, gestures which vary across the continents, the centuries, and the civilizations?
An example would be the question of bowing. In ancient Israelite culture, both before and after the giving of the Law on Sinai, bowing was and continued to be a very common gesture of respect, appropriate not only to the Lord our God, but also to any person, place, or thing one wanted, legitimately, to honor.
The holy men and women of the Hebrew people did, frequently and legitimately, bow and even prostrate to the ground, to show respect for the anointed King, for a true prophet, for Jerusalem, for the Temple, for the Ark of the Covenant, --- that is, for revered persons, places and things.
I have quite a list here
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/religion/3059418/posts?page=292#292
... of Abraham, Jacob, Leah, Isaac and Rebekah, Jacob and Rachel, bowing down before persons and things whom they honored. Moses bowed down to his father-in-law, Ruth bowed down to Boaz, etc. etc.
In not one of these cases is it seen as idolatry, even though in the First Commandment (and other places) God says not to bow down to anyone but Himself.
But as I say, these dozens and dozens of other examples are not seen as adoring strange gods. Why?
The reason why is because they understood that there is a different in intent between bowing before Mt. Zion, say, or the anointed King, and bowing before God Himself.
I don't have time to elaborate on this right now, but it is a concern which has arisen whenever Christianity encounters a different culture. For instance missionaries found, and still find, that it difficult to help people in a Hindu culture understand that when we place a wreath on a grave, we are not proclaiming that the deceased has become a god. Nor is it easy for them to understand that we are not polytheistic, even though we worship and adore the Trinity.
We have an obligation to strive for deeper cross-cultural understanding.
Thank you for bringing up this topic with reference to the Aztecs. Once can think of other such examples of an alien culture not understanding the Christians, and vice-versa.