Worship of statues?

Catholics believe that the Bible forbids making or using images for the purpose of worshipping them "you shall not bow down to them or serve them". (Ex. 20:5). This commandment is absolute. God forbids the worship of any idol, including statues, power, sex, money, and oneself. However, when Catholics kneel before a crucifix or a statue, this kneeling is a sign of reverence to God, not the image.!

The Catholic Church forbids the worship of idols or anything created. This is the sin of idolatry. Only God is to be worshipped!! The Church's teaching on this can be found in the Catechism of the Catholic Church (CCC). The catechism # 2113 states that "idolatry not only refers to false pagan worship. It remains a constant temptation to faith. Idolatry consists in divinizing what is not God. Man commits idolatry whenever he honors and reveres a creature in place of God, whether this be gods or demons(for example, satanism), power, pleasure, race, ancestors, the state, money,ect. Jesus says, "you cannot serve God and mammon"(Matthew 6:24). Many martyers died for not adoring "the Beast" (Rev. 13-14) refusing even to simulate such worship. Idolatry rejects the unique Lordship of God; it is therefore incompatible with communion with God." (Gal 5:20; Eph. 5:5).

The use of statues and icons for liturgical purposes ( as opposed to idols) happened in the Old Testament. God commanded Moses, on several occasions, to make a brazen serpent in Numbers 21, and cherubim of gold in Exodus 25 nad 37. The brazen serpent shows the use of a statue (looking to it) in order to receive a blessing from God (healing from snakebite). When the people started to worship this statue, king Hezekiah had it destroyed (2 Kgs 18:4). This shows us the difference between the proper religious use of statues and idolatry.

If we can memorialize mere political heroes with statues, and that of war heroes with monuments, then there should be no objection to remembering saints and righteous men and women. These statues are simply a visual reminder of great saints and heroes of the faith.