Now a circuit court judge in Fairfax County will rule on whether the dissenting congregations can keep their church property, or whether these must remain with the Episcopal Church.

The row centres on the consecration of the Bishop of New Hampshire, a partnered gay man, whose appointment has split the worldwide Anglican Communion.

The case is high-profile because of the vast amounts of money involved. Although the case only relates to 11 congregations, they are among the wealthiest in the Episcopal Church.

State law appears to rule that if there is a split in a denomination, the congregation can keep its property if it cedes. However, the Episcopal Church is claiming that as the congregations left the denomination, they have forfeited ownership of the properties.

And today, in a separate case, the Episcopal Diocese of Forth Worth, Texas, has requested alternative Episcopal oversight, other than from the Church’s Presiding Bishop, Katharine Jefferts Schori (pictured).

The Bishop of the Diocese, Jack Iker, has suggested three options, one involving the creation of a new Anglican Province in North America, transferring to another Province, or seeking the status of an extra-provincial diocese under the authority of the Archbishop of Canterbury.

The request for alternative primatial oversight was first made by the Diocese the day after the election of Jefferts Schori last year, but has now been restated. The Presiding Bishop responded to that first request by offering a ‘primatial vicar’, who would be accountable to the Presiding Bishop, but this was rejected.

When it was discussed by the Anglican Primates meeting in Tanzania this February, a variation on that, which would have created a primatial vicar, but one who was ‘Windsor-compliant’, was proposed.

That would have meant a vicar thus appointed would have been in support of the Church’s Windsor Report, which advocated a more conservative rule of order in the Church.

However, the Episcopal Church's House of Bishops rejected that plan during its March meeting, saying it "would be injurious to The Episcopal Church".