Where did I state that and what specific meaning are you ascribing to that term veneration? Jesus DID elevate certain of the disciples and even Jewish leaders above others. It's not as if Jesus was opposed to the principle of recognizing elevated levels of spirituality in fact, he demonstrated it. Your hang up on the word veneration just sounds like a semantic game that is opposed to Christian thinking.
Certainly there can be nothing wrong with recognizing that a person has attained a very high level of spirituality since Jesus did himself..
How can a system ever hope to consistently produce saints if the highest level of those characteristics are not described taught and measured? Lots of extra biblical literature did describe, teach and categorize all of this. There's nothing fringe about it....
It's as if you have no education whatsoever about Christian spirituality here....
I've said this twice now but it seems you've never seen any of the early church commentary on the scriptures, any of the desert fathers or any of the church fathers.
Not to mention that it's a ridiculous claim to think that you can only do anything that was done in the New testament!!! Where does it say it at and then your testament? It doesn't. In fact it says the opposite in several places!!!!!
Maybe you shouldn't be discussing this.