Nowhere in Scripture are we instructed to pray to people who have died. That is the objection. We ask friends and family and pastors and such to pray for us. But Mad Dawg, I would dare say that Catholics pray to Mary more than they pray to the Lord. And you know well that some have taken Marian devotion to the point of worship. Not some, a lot. We simply see nothing like what Marian devotion has become in the Bible or the very early church.
Well, in the Scripture we are instructed only to pray the Lord's Prayer. Any other prayer could be objectionable as superfluous.
If those who are in heaven are alive, and if the Kingdom of Heaven abides in us, then it is not objectionable.
And you know well that some have taken Marian devotion to the point of worship. Not some, a lot
That's possible, but you will have to provide some credible statistics to back this up. The Church cannot be held accountable for excesses of the individual members, but what the Church backs as doctrine. As far as the Church teaching is concerned, your statement is false.
We simply see nothing like what Marian devotion has become in the Bible or the very early church
Marian devotion appears with +Ignatius, the thrid bishop of Antioch and a disciple of Apostoles (end of 1st century, doesn't get much earlier than that).
One thing is certain though: there are no traces of sola-scriptura "reformers" in the early Church, and for the next 1,400 years.
To the instances of Mariolatry: Some Protestants have taken protest to the point of becoming Unitarians. Some have taken good old sola scriptura to very strange places indeed, cf. Jehovah's Witnesses. Long ago and in another country I offered the principle "Lilies that fester smell far worse than weeds," by which I mean to say that a good thing's being able to be perverted doesn't necessarily mean it's not a good thing. And just for the sake of orneriness, I'll dispute "a lot" on the grounds that if we'll allow excessive language becaue of affectionate devotion then it's REALLY hard to tell from appearances whose excessive in their intentions. If you'd heard some of the things I said to my daughter, when she was little, you'd think I worshipped her.
To praying to the dead: He is not God of the dead but of the living, for all live to Him. (formulaic but I hope you get where I'm going.)
To the time spent in Prayer. To each, I wouldn't know. I know I spend maybe 15-20 minutes each day in a Rosary and less time than that on my "office" (which, since I rejoice in my lay status, is kind of informal -- okay, REALLY informal -- but involves Scripture, especially Psalms - I love the Psalms - and reading some wise and holy people). But, this may sound weird, I don't think of/experience the Rosary as devoted to Mary exclusively. I am WAY more into the mysteries.
oOr example, I MAY occasionally think about what it was like for Mary to being Jesus to the temple for the Presentation -- and remember what it was like bringing my child to Church for the Thanksgiving after childbirth -- but I more often think about what it is like for the God for whose worship the temple was built to enter it in disguise, how the awesome God, before whom we would fall to our faces and our tongues cleave at least temporarily to the rooves of our mouths, could, so to speak, fit inside a "little, bitty baby" and so inside a little bitty temple. As in the Mass I find myself wondering how the whole thing doesn't splinter and blow apart in fragments or burn as Spike does at the end of Buffy the Vampire Slayer.
And actually, I am going to more weekday Masses now, so I bet the formally intended towrd the Holy Trinity is statistically stomping the time spent in Rosaries. (This'll bug you, it bugs me: I have a feeling that there's a connection between my Rosarying and my desire to make the 35 minute 20 mile one way drive to St Tom's for weekday Mass.)
Bible and Early Church: Oh, let's just open up another thread devoted to things Catholics and Protestants can say to each other by the numbers. Like the old joke about jokes. As the Orthodox brethren have said very well in this thread, our attitude toward Scripture and tradtion and such is really different from the Protestant attitude and more, how shall I say, organic. You know how that one goes.