It's a very strange hullaballoo with saints in Catholicism. Catholics don't really pray to saints, just like they don't really pray to Mary. There are "Prayers" to saints and Mary, but that's a misnomer. They really should be called intercessions because Catholics merely ask these people in heaven to pray for them.
My favourite is when a Catholic and a Mormon start discussing this subject. Baptism by proxy inevitably comes up, and things just go downhill from there.
The word "saint" simply means "one who is sanctified" and can therefore refer to any believer, canonised or not.