The Apostle John, the son of Zebedee, and he who Jesus loved. Do we love John? Do we pray to John?
I venerate and ask for the intercession of St. John the Beloved Disciple, Evangelist, Apostle and Theologian, but I don’t worship him, nor do I worship the Blessed Virgin Mary, but I ask her intercession and venerate her to the fullest extent.. As I said in another thread on Marian intercession, just as we are privileged to develop a relationship with Christ, we can also develop a relationship with the Church Triumphant, the Saints who are Alive in Christ.
I have a devotion to a number of saints, especially martyrs like St. Ignatius of Antioch and St. Abanoub, and monastics like St. Anthony, who consecrated their lives to pray for people like me unceasingly in the desert, and also gallant Church Fathers like St. Athanasius, St. Gregory the Theologian, St. John Chrysostom, St. Cyril of Antioch, and St. Ephrem the Syrian, and many others, and to the Archangels and my guardian angel, and the rest of the Heavenly Host, the names of the Honorable Cherubim and Glorious Seraphim being unknown to me but my admiration for them being very great.
But the highest veneration is due to the Mother of God. To quote the Divine Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom:
It is truly meet to bless you, O Theotokos, ever-blessed and most pure, and the Mother of our God. More honorable than the Cherubim, and more glorious beyond compare than the Seraphim, without defilement you gave birth to God the Word. True Theotokos we magnify you!
And to quote the Divine Liturgy of St. Basil:
All of Creation rejoices in thee, O full of grace:
the angels in heaven and the race of men,
O sanctified temple and spiritual paradise,
the glory of virgins, of whom God was incarnate
and became a child, our God before the ages.
He made thy body into a throne,
and thy womb more spacious than the heavens.
All of creation rejoices in thee, O full of grace:
Glory be to thee.
But of course, only God, the Father, Son and Holy Ghost is worthy of worship and adoration. Indeed, our Lady tells us, the servants and handmaids of our Lord, her Divine Son: “Whatever He says to you, do it.”