Scholars and policy-makers have increasingly sought to understand the relationship between poverty and place in the inner city. This paper examines the spatiality of an anti-poverty strategy called ‘gentrification with justice’ and implemented by an urban ministry collective in three neighbourhoods in Atlanta, Georgia, USA. This place-based approach centres on the movement of middle-class ‘strategic neighbours’ into impoverished neighbourhoods as a way to transform the local socio-spatial dialectic of poverty. The urban ministry collective draws upon notions of diverse community, social justice, the ‘where’ of faithful practice and a faith-governed market in seeking to redevelop neighbourhoods. Based on archival analysis and semi-structured, in-depth interviews with leaders and members of the urban ministry collective, this paper provides a deeper understanding of the place-making role that faith-motivated actors play in local contexts of poverty.
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