
Situated on the corner of perhaps one of the most average of all midtown blocks is a gym called Limelight Fitness. The most interesting feature of this gym is not any of its many facilities, not even its indoor cycling studio (MNSTR CYCLE if anyone is interested in that kind of thing). Rather, it is the building that houses all of the glorious personnel, programming, and equipment that is Limelight Fitness that makes this place of interest to the theologically inclined, (very) occasional blogger. Limelight Fitness is housed in a former Christian church, which became a drug rehabilitation program, then a nightclub, and then a shopping mall, before finally assuming its current guise as a place of physical self improvement. Through all of these radical transformations of purpose, the exterior of the building itself seems to have changed very little. I would posit that this is the result of a series of choices to maintain its appearance, so as to benefit commercially from the religious connotations that follow from that appearance.
Let us take, for example, its current use as a fitness facility. Nearly everyone will have heard the phrase “my body is a temple,” and almost intuitively grasp the connection between religious ideas of “the sacred,” and societal ideas of the maintenance of one’s own physical body as a sacred thing. At Limelight Fitness, this connection is made explicit. As Niebuhr writes, “religion is at one and the same time, humility before the absolute and self assertion in terms of the absolute” (Niebuhr 63-64). This idea, the balance between humility and self assertion, is at work in every workout, in every physical transformation, that takes place in any gym anywhere in the world. It is not easy to get in shape, and it requires both the humility to recognize that one is out of shape, and the power to assert that one will change this fact. However, this occurs not in the face of the absolute, but rather in pursuit of personal beauty, ie. self aggrandizement. The notable thing about Limelight Fitness, is that it deliberately, if implicitly, encourages the sublimation of this will to beauty, if you will, into the larger religious idea of “the absolute.” By maintaining the look of a place of worship, Limelight whispers into the ears of its clients that their pursuit of the perfect body is a holy pursuit, a worshipful activity, a performance of devotion.
Herein lies the danger. Niebuhr goes on to say that “...religion results also in the absolutizing of the self. It is a sublimation of the will to live…” (Niebuhr 63-64). Is it so inconceivable to think that this will to beauty is really a will to power? Why would one seek to be fit if it did not come with advantages? Perhaps, at Limelight, the real purpose of working out becomes clear: the absolutizing of the self through the sublimation of the will to power not into religion or God, but into fitness.
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