Catholics pray to the Saints which seems to go against of the premise that only through Christ is salvation. A saint is person who was chosen by the Catholic church hierarchy, not God, to represent God.
One of the ten commandments clearly states that thou shalt have no gods before me; thou shalt not make idols.
A Pope, a Bishop, or even the priest cannot offer salvation. So confessing your sins to another “flawed sinner” is a misdirection. And doing penance as instructed by your priest is also wrong. A priest cannot offer absolution of sin and for a priest claim the same is sacrilegious.
Saints are those in Heaven with Christ. So I expect some of my ancestors are in Heaven with God and they are saints including my mother and grandparents. There are canonized saints that have gone through a process that the Catholic Church declares them a saint . Such as ST. Pope John Paul II, ST. John XXIII, ST Christopher, etc.
Just as a mother prays to God on behalf of her children or herself, we pray to the Blessed Mother and the saints to listen to us and also pray to God for us.
As Scripture indicates, those in heaven are aware of the prayers of those on earth. This can be seen, for example, in Revelation 5:8, where John depicts the saints in heaven offering our prayers to God under the form of “golden bowls full of incense, which are the prayers of the saints.” But if the saints in heaven are offering our prayers to God, then they must be aware of our prayers. They are aware of our petitions and present them to God by interceding for us.
But asking one person to pray for you in no way violates Christ’s mediatorship, as can be seen from considering the way in which Christ is a mediator. First, Christ is a unique mediator between man and God because he is the only person who is both God and man. He is the only bridge between the two, the only God-man. But that role as mediator is not compromised in the least by the fact that others intercede for us. Furthermore, Christ is a unique mediator between God and man because he is the Mediator of the New Covenant (Heb. 9:15, 12:24), just as Moses was the mediator (Greek mesitas) of the Old Covenant (Gal. 3:19–20).
Why not pray directly to Jesus?” they ask.
The answer is: “Of course one should pray directly to Jesus!” But that does not mean it is not also a good thing to ask others to pray for one as well.
Catholics do not worship anyone but God.
http://www.catholic.com/tracts/praying-to-the-saints
All pardon for sins ultimately comes from Christ’s finished work on Calvary, but how is this pardon received by individuals? Did Christ leave us any means within the Church to take away sin? The Bible says he gave us two means.
Baptism was given to take away the sin inherited from Adam (original sin) and any sins we personally committed before baptism—sins we personally commit are called actual sins, because they come from our own acts.
For sins committed after baptism, a different sacrament is needed. It has been called penance, confession, and reconciliation, each word emphasizing one of its.aspects. During his life, Christ forgave sins, as in the case of the woman caught in adultery (John 8:1–11) and the woman who anointed his feet (Luke 7:48). He exercised this power in his human capacity as the Messiah or Son of man, telling us, “the Son of man has authority on earth to forgive sins” (Matt. 9:6), which is why the Gospel writer himself explains that God “had given such authority to men” (Matt. 9:8).
Since he would not always be with the Church visibly, Christ gave this power to other men so the Church, which is the continuation of his presence throughout time (Matt. 28:20), would be able to offer forgiveness to future generations. He gave his power to the apostles, and it was a power that could be passed on to their successors and agents, since the apostles wouldn’t always be on earth either, but people would still be sinning.
God had sent Jesus to forgive sins, but after his resurrection Jesus told the apostles, “‘As the Father has sent me, even so I send you.’ And when he had said this, he breathed on them, and said to them, ‘Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained’” (John 20:21–23). (This is one of only two times we are told that God breathed on man, the other being in Genesis 2:7, when he made man a living soul. It emphasizes how important the establishment of the sacrament of penance was.)
http://www.catholic.com/tracts/the-forgiveness-of-sins
Jesus delegated the authority to forgive sins to Bishops and Priests. Yes, we gain salvation and eternal life with God through the sacrifice on the cross by Jesus.