The Sydney Archbishop, Peter Jensen, is facing a legal challenge over his church's decision to break with the national church and permit apprentice ministers to give Holy Communion.

The highest court of the Australian Anglican Church, the Appellate Tribunal, will decide the contentious question of whether church laws allow deacons or church workers to preside over the Lord's Supper, a duty exclusively performed by ordained priests and bishops.

The question has been a source of simmering tensions inside the Anglican Church for more than 30 years.