The memorial service for my Aunt Martha was going strong when the Rosary ladies filed into the chapel at Providence Mount St. Vincent in West Seattle. They made their way to the pews, using canes and walkers, beads at the ready. They sat down and waited for the service to end.

The stories about Aunt Martha did not stop, even though Rosary time was 15 minutes overdue. Fitting, because Aunt Martha, who died at 91, never gave up the floor unless she was finished speaking. She was an opinionated woman long before it was fashionable. Aunt Martha was also a lifelong atheist who ended her days in a Catholic senior care community.

My Uncle Armand, inconsolable from losing his mate of 68 years, didn’t budge, though, when my sister CarolLynn assured him he’d see Martha again in heaven.

“No, I don’t believe in that,” he said.

But he does believe in and cherish the care he’s received at The Mount, as it’s called. He and Aunt Martha didn’t mind that Providence sisters founded and still help run the place. They didn’t mind that some of the caregivers are Catholics, some Muslim and others, evangelical Christians.

All that mattered was that they were surrounded by people who had their well-being in heart and mind. At the end of their lives, they understood that the categories that separate us – including religion, race and socio-economic status – can be obliterated.

I call it grace. Uncle Armand might prefer the word “luck.”

You witness this grace-luck phenomenon in facilities where older people live because many of their caregivers are new immigrants. The Mount, for instance, boasts that its employees represent 27 countries of origin. Nationally, one in five caregivers was born abroad.

In the Inland Northwest, caregivers hail from the Slavic countries, as well as Asian and African countries, and Spanish-speaking nations, according to Michael Hatcher, who has been with Spokane’s Elder Services for 28 years.

Hatcher, who is also a priest at St. Gregorios Malankara Syrian Orthodox Church in Spokane, says immigrant members of his church speak nine different languages, and many work as caregivers.

Hatcher pointed out that in care facilities, older people who lived through the Cold War might interact for the first time with someone who grew up in Russia. “Their inclination is to think: ‘Maybe they aren’t half bad. They are like me. They are decent and kind and good and I couldn’t get along without them.’ “

One of Uncle Armand’s caregivers is from Gambia, and she supports an extended family of 12, still in Gambia, with her paychecks. She kept vigil, along with my cousins Lee and Ann, during Aunt Martha’s final days.

The need for elder care might just solve the immigration debate. According to the American Immigration Law Foundation, the long-term care work force will grow 35 percent by 2014. The projected labor force will not keep up with the demand, and things will grow increasingly dire as boomers reach older age.

In the e-mail describing Aunt Martha’s death, my cousin Lee added this quote by Maya Angelou: “Spirit is an invisible force made visible in all life.”

In the chapel where my Aunt Martha’s life was celebrated, elderly white Rosary ladies, women from Africa, Catholics, atheists and everyone in between sat together, the spirit visible in all these disparate lives.

In one voice we sang “Amazing Grace” – Aunt Martha’s favorite hymn. How lucky we felt to be there together.