Earlier this week, Irene Gleeson – “mama” to thousands of Ugandan children – went home to the Lord. Irene was the Australian grandmother who, in the last two decades of her life, ran a charity looking after thousands of Ugandan children displaced by civil unrest.

Watch a tribute video for Irene, here:

One of the last few things she had up on her Facebook page was a call to people “ not to die with the music, dance or hug still in you…. Share it with others.”

Irene certainly lived up to that credo. She was a forty-seven year old grandmother when she gave up a comfortable life in Australia to start Childcare Kitgum Services (now the Irene Gleeson Foundation). Moved by the trauma she saw in Uganda, she started looking after, feeding and teaching “50 children under a mango tree.”

Since 1991, that work has grown to care for more than 20,000 children. Bible Society supporters, through a former project of Bible Society NSW, sent Bibles for the children, helping them know that God loved them and was in control of their lives. “Sharing God’s Word was very important to Irene; she was always quoting Scripture when she spoke to people,” says the Bible Society’s Chris Melville who liaised with Irene on the project.

Mid last year Irene was diagnosed with cancer of the heart and lungs. Facing this with her trademark faith–and equally, her concern for the children of Kitgum–she returned to Kitgum. “Please God, comfort and nourish my motherless children in Uganda,” was the prayer in her heart as she went about setting things in place for the work to continue after her.”

Paul and Alice Zagorski  are longtime supporters of Irene’s work, helping out from Australia. They are part of a board that’s been set up here, working closely with a similar board in Uganda.

“She did that as she wanted it all set up properly,” says Paul. The couple helped Irene’s family by caring for her in their own home in the last three months of her life.

“She was an easy patient, never complaining,” says Alice. She loved the atmosphere here, and she loved her family coming every day to see her.  She kept up her smile and fought the good fight till the end. But she did also want to go home to the Lord, after enduring so much.”

“We’re going to miss her.”

The children at Kitgum were told of “mama’s” passing

On Tuesday this week, the children at Kitgum were informed of Irene’s passing, by manager John Paul Kiffasi. “Mama Irene already said goodbye to them, in a video she recorded in April.” The photo he posted on his Facebook page says it all, but he urges, “Mama Irene is resting in peace, but her legacy has to continue.”

450 workers are carrying on Irene’s work, many of them the very children she looked after in the early years. The Irene Gleeson Foundation currently supplies food, medicine and an education for 8,000 Ugandan children. The one school has grown into five, and there is also a radio station, an AIDS hospice, a music recording studio and a cultural arts studio.  Irene also helped create water wells, and established many community churches.

You can help continue Irene’s legacy of Christian faith as well as practical help for thousands of children

“All will be as normal.  We will still keep running the operation as she wanted,” say Paul and Alice, one of the 3000 Australians whose support helps keep the mission alive.

“She wanted to leave a legacy, and she has.”

If  you too would like to help Irene’s legacy continue, visit: www.irenegleesonfoundation.com

A funeral service for Irene Gleeson was held at 10am on Monday morning, 29 July at C3 Church, Oxford Falls, north of Sydney.