Thank you for your question, Adam, and your faithful service to our Lord! I do think that I can be of help to you and your friend.
Your friend is quite correct that “worshiping man rather than God” would be idolatry. But the allegation that Christianity implies the worship of a man betrays a lack of understanding of the Christian doctrine of the incarnation. The orthodox doctrine of the incarnation promulgated at the Council of Chalcedon is emphatic that in the incarnate Christ there is one and only one, undivided person who has two distinct natures, one human and one divine. That one person is the second person of the Trinity, the Son, and is therefore divine. He is not a human person, nor is there another person who is Christ and is human. That would be the heresy of Nestorianism, positing a plurality of persons in Christ. There is only one person who is Christ, and that person is divine. Thus, there is no human person named “Jesus of Nazareth.” Jesus is a divine person, and medieval theologians were careful never to refer to Jesus as a human person.
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