The only contradiction is in your mind. No one can help you if you refuse to be helped.
The erroneous notion of praying to dead human beings is found nowhere in Scripture, yet is expressly forbidden in Scripture.
The dead are either in heaven with God because Christ paid for every one of their sins on the cross, or they have been condemned to hell as just punishment for their transgressions against God.
Therefore, the dead have no need of our prayers.
And we have no need of the dead's prayers because we know for a certainty that "there is one God, and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus." (1 Timothy 2:5)
Apparently, Rome doesn't offer this assurance to its memebership, thus making men uncertain, fearful and frustrated, ever striving for something Christ has already accomplished for them, if God so wills.
No one can help you if you refuse to be helped.
= = =
My goodness . . . !
A glimmer of understanding of how Prottys tend to feel on such threads about the other side! What a novel idea.