Pawtucket Red Sox owner Ben Mondor with the Pawtucket Red Sox mascot, Paws, at the fundraiser.

The Boston Red Sox, the PawSox and the Red Sox Foundation were honored last Monday, Nov. 13, for reaching out to a group home for abused boys in East Providence.

“The ongoing relationship between the boys in this group home and the Red Sox and PawSox has been a true field of dreams,” Thomas C. Robillard, who works for the electricity and gas utility National Grid, said at a lunch honoring the baseball organizations. More than 450 guests crowded into the Rhode Island Convention Center for the awards ceremony put on by Family Service of Rhode Island, which is devoted to helping struggling families.

“We are happy to share this cause with our big brothers in Boston,” said PawSox owner Ben Mondor. “PawSox stands for family inside and outside the ball field.”

He was joined on stage by Dr. Charles Steinberg of the Red Sox, who added that “the group home (called Quanacut House for boys 6 to 11 years old) is deep in our hearts. We have all gone to visit the house. We are encouraged to keep on doing it.”

He said that Red Sox owner John W. Henry has played Wiffle Ball with the boys at the home in East Providence. The Red Sox organization supports a group home in each of the New England states. Players and staff often make visits.

Steinberg said that he hoped other corporations and members of the community would hear of his group’s involvement in helping these children, and step up to the plate to do the same.

The award is a pastel called Three Dancing Children created by Narragansett artist Anne Mimi Sammis. She attended the event as did Lt. Gov.-elect Elizabeth Roberts, Sen. Jack Reed and Providence Police Chief Dean Esserman, who was the recipient of the first Brighter Futures Award in 2005. The event’s co-chairs in addition to Robillard were William Hatfield, Paul Cronin, Michael Ryan and Bradford Kopp.