It doesn't denigrate my religion (I was brought up Catholic). It assumes too much power and authority for mere mortals who should stick to glorifying God instead of trying to glorify men. Men may be deserving of wholesale love and respect, but not of reverence; reverence belongs to God.
Why?
I'll take your word for it. But I do have to say that you should make the effort to read about what the Catholic Church actually teaches and why, instead of holding to your particular caricature of the Church.
I apologize if I overreact, but there's a lot of people on Free Republic, whose only joy comes from going on the Catholic threads, with the intention to attack, belittle, and start flame wars between various Christian groups. I have never seen you post before, and I grouped you in with them. Now I know not to. The Communion of Saints, at least as I have been taught, are those people who have led exemplary lives, and should serve as examples of how Christians should live, and glorify God. We can ask them to intercede for us directly to God through Christ and with the guidance of the Holy Spirit. We do not pray to them, or worship them, and it is understood that the glorification of saints is not theirs, but truly belongs to God. "All glory and honor is yours almighty Father, for ever, and ever"
This is recognizing the work God has done in glorifying men, not gloryfying them on our own initiative. God glorifies the saints, we can only recognize his act in doing so.
I think I understand your concern, and it's a good one: you want to make sure that no creature is given the supreme adoration which belongs to God alone. In this you are right.
However, "reverence" doesn't mean only the supreme honor and veneration due to God. For example:
Joshua 4:14 That day the LORD exalted Joshua in the sight of all Israel; and they revered him all the days of his life, just as they had revered Moses.
The Bible also speaks of revering God's throne, His sanctuary, and His city Jerusalem. So clearly, "to revere" can mean to honor people or even places and things associated with God.
This is an inevitable aspect of our human nature. Love for a lovable person overflows to things, places, and other people associated with that person. A mother keeps forever a little valentine card made for her by her child who died young. An American serviceman in Iraq kisses a snapshot of his wife in the U.S. There is nothing wrong with this; in fact, it would be wrong, and a kind of spiritual violence, to ridicule it or try to suppress it.
Like all things human, it can take wrong turns or get misdirected or excessive. Returning to matters of faith, I suppose that there would be some people who would want to canonize Elvis Presley or Princess Di. That's why the Church sets up a formal procedure for canonization. The idea is to keep things based on oobjective virtue rather than mere popularity; and to seek God's guidance, which is why there is the requirement of miracles which can be investigated --- and believe me, they are investigated strictly.
As an example, since 1858 there have been thousands, even tens of thousands of reported healing miracles at the shrine of Lourdes, France. The number of verified miracles? ---71.
That doesn't mean than none of those other reported healings were miracles. It just means they were not investigates; or thy were investigsted and their supernatural provenance was found to be doubtful.