Alfons Brüning studies of History and Slavic Philology (Russian, Polish, Ukrainian) in Münster, Freiburg, Berlin; PhD in 2005; since 1991 regular visits for study and research in Ukraine; specialization (PhD) in Eastern European Religious Culture and Eastern/Orthodox Christianity; 2005-2007 Research fellow University of Muenster (D), Chair of Ecumenical Theology/Eastern Christianity; since 2007 Lecturer Eastern Christianity (with special attention for Post-Soviet Eastern Europe) at the Institute for Eastern Christian Studies, Radboud University Nijmegen (NL); since 2012 also endowed professor (bijzonder hoogleraar) "Eastern Christianity, Human Rights, Peace Studies" at PThU Amsterdam; since 2022 director of the Institute for Eastern Christian studies; main fields of research: Religious and confessional culture in early modern Europe (Muscovy, Ukraine, Poland-Lithuania etc.); Russian/Ukrainian Orthodoxy under the Soviet regime; modern developments in Eastern Christianity after the end of communism: Historical meomory, social ethics, Human Rights, political theology (regional focus Russia, Ukraine).