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You are very much mistaken. You continually conflate legitimate acts of respect (veneration) with prohibited acts of idolatry. I am sorry to say this, but your arguments, no matter how lengthy, all fail to "connect" because you do not make this very basic, all-important distinction.

We will have to disagree. First, it should be obvious that respect is different than veneration. It also grieves my heart when I see (protestants) who substitute the Bible for the God who wrote the Bible. That too, falls short of what God wants. It is equally true that many traditionalists substitute cherished traditions (they often grew up with), for worship of Him alone.
Biblical history shows humans regularly move from legitimate worship to idolatry. It is the fallen human condition of the heart.
The burning of incense to the bronze snake was condemned by God and the snake destroyed - despite being ordered into creation by God. Under your argument, it should have been venerated because it was associated with God. It was destroyed because it was venerated instead of God. It became idolatry and was judged. There was no legitimate veneration of the bronze serpent.
This despite the fact is was created under the most significant leader of Israel - Moses, "giver of the law."
Second, your argument about the Ark of the Covenant assumes people venerated the Ark. They did not. Everything they did was commanded by God. They did not bow down and venerate the staff of Aaron. They bowed down to a Holy God who provided a way to forgive their sins - despite their rebellion. Your argument also misses that they were being obedient to a command from God - not the desire of the fallen heart to gather things up and fall before them - like bones, thorns, mother's milk and other silly relics.
As such, the two arguments you put forward - items in the Ark and cloths used to heal - had nothing to do with veneration.
You cannot support your truth claim with arguments from Scripture that have nothing to do with your claim. This mixes apples and oranges and contains the implicit assumption that they are identical, so the former justifies the latter. They are not identical and because of this, the former never justifies the latter.

Their holiness is secondary and derivative. HIS holiness is primary, unique, sui generis. I think we both see that.

Their holiness (being set apart) is never a reason to venerate them. We do not bow before them. We do not burn incense to them (as Israel did to the snake), we do not melt down precious metals and create statues to bow down to. God alone is worthy of worship.
The line between "veneration" and worship is one of the shortest lines. This is why God repeatedly and severely condemns crossing that line. He doesn't just condemn heart worship that is unseen to the human eye. He condemns body position - bowing, and acts of worship - burning incense. He condemns images, statues, sacred stones, etc. And tellingly, He condemns even the prostration and incense before the bronze snake He Himself ordered into existence.
In all the history of mankind, after the Garden of Eden and the Fall, people fall into idolatry as a matter of course - even with the things God has either commanded or created. This is why the warnings are so strong:

"Little children, keep yourselves from idolatry."
You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God, punishing the children for the sin of the parents to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me, Ex 20:5
[note: neither bow down nor worship - both included]
Do not bow down before their gods or worship them or follow their practices. You must demolish them and break their sacred stones to pieces. Ex 23:24
"'Do not make idols or set up an image or a sacred stone for yourselves, and do not place a carved stone in your land to bow down before it. I am the LORD your God. Lev 26:1
"I will cut off your carved images And your sacred pillars from among you, So that you will no longer bow down To the work of your hands. Micah 5:13

You have an argument that you have not provided Biblical support for. I am listing many verses (out of a greater universe of similar verses in Scripture) that prohibit bowing to created things. The bronze snake is the most telling. It was ordered into creation by God. It performed a function of healing ordered and empowered by God. The people burned incense to it. God understood their hearts - that this was an act of worship to a good thing made into an idol - taking the place of God Himself.
Here is a similar modern day example from a church:
Cardinal Bretone (I've seen him identified as) offering incense to the blood of John Paul II.
Always wrong. These acts fail to go directly to God and are as old as the Fall and expulsion from the Garden and are idolatry - substituting a created thing for the One True God, who is a jealous God. As such, they are not Christian. They are pagan worship.
There are no examples of Apostles offering incense to relics, departed saints, etc. You won't find it in the inspired NT Scriptures. You won't find it in Christian art before 100ad. You won't find it as a Christian practice, written about anywhere before 100ad - Christian or secular.
You will find it in pagan history - over the milennia - in their art, writings, etc.
And of course, you will find it condemned by God in Scripture in both Testaments.

Butting in here, but the distinction is artificial when claiming Cath veneration of Mary etc, excludes worship, as words that can mean veneration and also can denote worship in describing activity, and it is RCs who fail to demonstrate that what they do is consistent with their claimed "very basic, all-important distinction."

As i have said before, one would have a hard time in Bible times explaining kneeling before a statue and praising the entity it represented in the unseen world, beseeching such for Heavenly help, and making offerings to them, and giving glory and titles and ascribing attributes to such which are never given in Scripture to created beings (except to false gods), including having the uniquely Divine power glory to hear and respond to virtually infinite numbers of prayers individually addressed to them in Heaven.

Which manner of adulation would constitute worship in Scripture, yet Catholics imagine that by playing word games then they can avoid crossing the invisible line between mere "veneration" and worship.

Moses, put down those rocks! I was only engaging in hyper dulia, not adoring her. Can't you tell the difference?

While I see that the Holy Spirit can use words that are distinctive of the activity of worship (Heb.: Todah=thanksgiving to God; Zamar=praise of God; GK: Proskuneō = worship, as to prostrate; latreia=service of God) as well as others that are not exclusively used for such toward God/Christ, yet worship is defined by what it describes. Thus souls can be charged with idolatry or as being idolators without being described as engaging in latreia or OT equivalents, but due to their activity. Such as in praying to an invisible entity with praise and adulation, imploring such for heavenly aid (sometimes including bowing down to a statute of it), and or making offerings to these supernatural beings (including wholly dedicating themselves to them), and or ascribing to such attributes and glory that are uniquely ascribed to God/Christ in Scripture.

Yet somehow RCs do all such and yet imagine that it would be understood as worship in Scripture, and argue that their activity which is identical with what only God is given in Scripture is actually merely being (in Latin) "hyperdulia," and not "latria" (Gk. = latreia) in Scripture. However, latria actually is only used for service of God in the NT, (Jn. 16:2, Rom. 9:4, Heb. 9:1; 9:6) and which service many Catholics also offer to Mary as a supernatural being in the spiritual realm, offering themselves wholly to her, and who can be corporately communicated to mentally or hear from Heaven.

Yet the Holy Spirit presents God as the only supernatural being in Heaven that offerings and total dedicatory service is made to by believers, and the only such being whom believers on earth pray to. And who can hear from Heaven those on earth who communicate mentally or otherwise. I see communication btwn created beings only taking place with both somehow being in the same realm, and with no intercession to God being requested.

While latreia is only used of worship of God, other words are used for worship, but following the Cath rationale pagans could claim that were not worshiping their false gods.

Sebomai: to revere, to worship. (Thayer)

But in vain they do worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men. (Matthew 15:9)

Saying, This fellow persuadeth men to worship God contrary to the law. (Acts 18:13)

And a certain woman named Lydia, a seller of purple, of the city of Thyatira, which worshipped God, heard us: whose heart the Lord opened, that she attended unto the things which were spoken of Paul. (Acts 16:14)

And he departed thence, and entered into a certain man's house, named Justus, one that worshipped God, whose house joined hard to the synagogue. (Acts 18:7)

So that not only this our craft is in danger to be set at nought; but also that the temple of the great goddess Diana should be despised, and her magnificence should be destroyed, whom all Asia and the world worshippeth. (Acts 19:27)

You can no more say Caths are not worshipping the (great goddess) Mary of Catholicism etc. by calling their activity (as described below) "veneration" than you can say the pagans were giving mere veneration to their great goddess.