A US pastor reportedly died of a sudden heart attack on Sunday after his wife accused him of adultery in front of their church congregation.

Bishop Bobby Davis of the Miracle Faith World Outreach Church in Bridgeport, Connecticut was pronounced dead at Bridgeport hospital later that day.

An elder of the church told the Connecticut Post that Davis willingly confessed his transgressions. "After the service on Sunday the bishop's family asked us to remain in the church...He wanted to come clean with all of us," Judy Stovall says.

"He wanted to ask our forgiveness."

Stovall contends that many members of the church immediately responded with love and support: "We were shouting 'We forgive you, we love you' but the stress of all of it – he had a heart attack.

"I held his head as he lay on the floor. Our congregation is hurting now."

However, a member of the church recalls a different version of events. Preferring to remain anonymous, the source told the Christian Post that Davis had privately confessed to his wife, but she then forced him to announce his infidelity to the congregation.

"I'm told that when he walked through the door she basically told him, 'Tell them what you just told me,' which is what induced the heart attack, because it's not like he was walking into it knowing," the source says.

"She said it and he said, 'Yes, that's right.'...Apparently it was his family members who reacted out in anger, from what I understand. It was not the congregation."

The source shared that Davis' family attacked the pastor physically in a scene reminiscent of "a bad reality TV show".

"My heart is so devastated because it could have been handled in a private manner," the source adds.

Davis' infidelity has come as a great shock to his congregation, which he has led since the church's founding in 1967, as he and his wife recently celebrated their 50^th anniversary and he is also qualified as a marriage and family therapist.

Police are investigating the matter, and the official cause of death is pending review. A statement from Bridgeport Police Department spokesman Bill Kaempffer quoted in the Huffington Post said investigators were "confident there is no criminal element".