Everyone who gathered at the funeral ceremony of Irene Fernandez - the 'iron lady' from Sungai Petani and Malaysia’s champion of migrant workers rights - reaffirmed her righteous fight.

Her family and priests blessed it and her closest confidants pledged it in their hearts.

Irene, most famous for frustrating the Malaysian courts who tried to jail her for speaking up for the abused workers, received a simple send off, without pomp and grandeur.

About 2,000 people turned up today at the Divine Mercy Church in Shah Alam to say their last goodbyes and to send her off to her Father in heaven.

Outside, there were four wreaths of pure white daisies.

Inside, the crowd who braved grey clouds and heavy rain comprised mostly of NGO workers, maids, migrants and regular church-goers - her family and friends, mostly in casual clothes.

“During the last minutes of her life, we read her a beautiful prayer. As a family, we want you back... but we told her we would take on the fight. God knows what is best and she must accept whatever God gives.

“No anger, no grief but a good send-off,” Irene’s husband Joseph Paul said of Irene’s last moments in Serdang hospital where she was admitted after collapsing suddenly from a massive heart complication on March 25.

Irene died on March 31, which is also her 35th wedding anniversary.

"Perhaps it was her way to ensure that I will not forget the date," said Joseph Paul, as some in the audience broke into a smile.

Taking the podium from her father, Irene’s elder daughter Katrina said that looking at the crowd, she admitted it was hard to disentangle Irene the activist from Irene the loving mother.

She was as her husband described her - an iron lady with a soft heart who also cooked “fantastic meals”.

“Her heart beat with the same love and justice,” Katrina said.

“When we were small, mother would carry us above her head and we would feel like we were flying... raising us above the unkindness of the world,” she said, adding that this was also what she did for many others.

Katrina said that Irene was an awful singer but she often sang to them, with hands punching the air and legs kicking.

They never understood until they grew up and realised that Irene was not singing nursery rhymes but Bob Marley protest songs.

Katrina sung a refrain from a song she remembered: “Get up, stand up. Stand up for your right,” and the mourners broke into laughter.

Two bishops at funeral

Two bishops were at her funeral.

While the mass was presided over by Bishop of Penang Sebastian Francis, it was an elderly priest and family friend - Archbishop Emeritus Soter Fernandez who gave the eulogy later after the communion ceremony, and the song ‘Amazing Grace’ was beautifully sung by all.

Reading from Irene’s own words, Soter said to the crowd: “No one owns God, Allah, Andavar, etc...

“Anyone who uses God’s name to control, threaten, marginalise others and seek power is not only a coward but one who obstructs truth, justice and love.

"God created all of us and it is my duty to build peace, equality and justice and I will do so let it be in the name of God, Allah, Andavar or Theivam."

The funeral service was mostly conducted in English except for when it came to saying the prayer Jesus taught his disciples - the ‘Bapa Kami’ (Our Father) - which was recited entirely in Malay, and then the priest asked the living to greet one another with love while we still can.

The crowd, which consisted of people of all faiths, obliged.

In her death, Irene gathered an international crowd because her fight was for a universal truth that all men and women are created equal.   

As the funeral ceremony ended, Irene’s body in a white coffin with silver bar handles was carried out in a slow procession. In front, a bearer carried a black and white picture of a young and beautiful Irene with curly hair, looking to the left.

Her coffin, with a see-through glass top, was then placed outside the main church hall for a while for friends and family to say their last goodbyes.

Above the coffin, the words: “Jesus, I trust in you” beamed large.

As the rain stopped, Irene’s coffin was sealed with its fitting white cover and driven off to the crematorium. Her ashes will be buried alongside her parents in her hometown of Sungai Petani.

Irene died at 67 but her fight lives on.