Michael Coren
Encyclopedia
Michael Coren is an English-Canadian columnist
, author
, public speaker, radio host and television talk show host. He hosted the television talk show The Michael Coren Show
on the Crossroads Television System
from 1999 to 2011 when he moved to the Sun News Network to host an evening talk show, The Arena. He has also been a long-time radio personality, particularly on CFRB radio.
He has written more than ten books, including biographies of G.K. Chesterton, H. G. Wells
, Arthur Conan Doyle
, and C. S. Lewis
. His latest book, Why Catholics are Right, was published in 2011.
, England
. After obtaining a degree in politics from Nottingham University, he moved from the UK to Canada in 1987. For several years, he was a columnist for Frank
and then The Globe and Mail
, before he began syndicated columns for the Financial Post
and Sun Media
in 1995. Following his departure from Frank, he became a favourite target of that publication, culminating in a spoof ad contest to "deflower" Michael Coren (a nod to Frank' s notorious "Deflower Caroline Mulroney" contest, and a satirical jab at Coren's conservative leanings.) Coren had also been a favorite target of Frank back in the days before he began writing for them. Coren took exception to being labelled a "literary prostitute" during a 1994 interview.
His career as a broadcaster began in the early 1990s when he co-hosted a political debate segment with Irshad Manji
on TVOntario
's Studio 2
. In 1995, he began an evening talk show on CFRB
. In 1999, Coren briefly moved to Talk 640
for a short stint as its morning man. He returned to CFRB, where he hosted a show from 6:30 to 8:00 p.m. weekday nights, and regularly filled in for other hosts until November 2005. Coren was dismissed by CFRB as a result of complaints arising from comments ridiculing the weight of an apparent guest. In fact, the guest was an actor and the segment was scripted. According to CFRB's Operations Manager, Steve Kowch, "Pat Holiday, our general manager and myself went through the tape of Monday night's show and were shocked....it was totally out of bounds." Coren argues that it was a satire comparing in his mind public attitude to third world starvation with North America's obsession with slimming and self-indulgence. After moving to North America Coren gained one hundred pounds.
Despite this acrimonious termination, Coren made regular talk show appearances on CFRB in July 2006, at the start of the 2006 Israel-Lebanon conflict
, as he happened to be in Israel at the time. After receiving 60% approval from CFRB listeners in an August 2006 poll, Coren returned to the CFRB airwaves in September 2006 with a Sunday evening show. As of the 22nd of April 2007, the show expanded from its usual 1 hour 7-8pm to 7-9 pm. Coren celebrated by giving away double the prizes usually given out. In the fall of 2007 he and former Liberal Party of Canada
president Stephen LeDrew
launched a daily hour-long afternoon show on CFRB called Two Bald Guys With Strong Opinions in which the two argue about the issues of the day. After the departure of LeDrew, Coren was joined by Tarek Fatah
after several on air auditions by potential replacement co-hosts. Coren was again let go by CFRB along with 12 other staff of the Toronto radio station on 27 August 2009.
On television, Coren hosted the Michael Coren Show on the Crossroads Television System
until June 2011 when he left to join the Sun News Network where he hosts The Arena weeknights on beginning August 30, 2011. Coren also has a newspaper column published every Saturday in the Sun newspaper chain. He has been a columnist for the Western Standard
, Catholic Insight and The Women's Post and has contributed to National Post
, Reader's Digest
and several other publications. A self-professed Tottenham Hotspur
fan, he has appeared as a guest host on The Score's The Footy Show. Coren is also a public speaker, particularly at religious gatherings.
he responded:
In September 2006, Coren published an article in the Toronto Sun
, supporting the use of tactical nuclear strikes against Iran. This position was later retracted.
On the subject of AIDS Michael Coren wrote a column in 2006 titled "Why is AIDS so special?" in which he said "At its most simple, stop fornicating." "AIDS in the West is still overwhelmingly a threat to male homosexuals and intravenous drug users."
In an article which appeared in Sun Media in 2007, Coren said "As for Jesus not condemning homosexuality, nor did He condemn bestiality and necrophilia."
coalminers and converted to Judaism
. Coren's father and uncle were cab drivers. Coren has said that his father's family left Poland
a few decades before the Holocaust. He has also said that his father's family emigrated from Poland
in the 1890s. He said "People have called me an anti-Semite. I thought it quite rich since my father's family was massacred in the Holocaust". Michael Coren was profiled on Credo
, on Vision TV
, and said that his father told him he could not attend his son's wedding in a Catholic Church without becoming "physically sick."
He converted to Roman Catholicism in his early twenties while still living in England
, but that didn't last long. He said that he "converted to an institution." He eventually converted to Evangelical
Christianity in the 1990s, after a conversion experience
as an adult, greatly influenced by Canadian televangelist Terry Winter
.
In 1991 Michael Coren said in a column for a humour magazine: "The evangelical Christians may be intolerant, small-minded, and repellent, but at least they hold a consistent set of beliefs".
In a 1993 book review he said "Can anyone imagine a detective priest? Regrettably, it is easier to conjure up the image of a priest being questioned by secular detectives over abuse charges." Also in 1993, Michael Coren had a falling out with the Catholic Church over an unflattering profile he wrote of Archbishop Aloysius Ambrozic for Toronto
Life magazine. The Bishop, who made Coren a "Knight of the Holy Sepulchre" in a ceremony in October 1992, was quoted using words including "friggin" and "bitch", and said that Francisco Franco
was a "conservative Roman Catholic and not a bad fellow." Coren defended himself, saying "He's an archbishop and he was vulgar...obviously what thousands of Roman Catholics expected me to do was lie. I still get hate mail about the article."
After this incident, Coren said that he didn't consider himself a Roman Catholic anymore. He said "My wife is Catholic and the children will be raised Catholic, but that's it. It's just not there for me." Daniel Richler
observed that Coren loves scandal, but hates having it come his way. In one of his columns for the satirical humour magazine Frank
, Michael Coren depicted Mother Teresa
getting drunk in a bar.
In early 2004, he embraced Catholicism again. He cites St. Thomas More
, C. S. Lewis
, Ronald Knox
and his godfather Lord Longford as spiritual influences, and remains connected to the ecumenical scene in Canada and beyond.
Columnist
A columnist is a journalist who writes for publication in a series, creating an article that usually offers commentary and opinions. Columns appear in newspapers, magazines and other publications, including blogs....
, author
Author
An author is broadly defined as "the person who originates or gives existence to anything" and that authorship determines responsibility for what is created. Narrowly defined, an author is the originator of any written work.-Legal significance:...
, public speaker, radio host and television talk show host. He hosted the television talk show The Michael Coren Show
The Michael Coren Show
The Michael Coren Show is an hour-long Ontario-based panel show hosted by Michael Coren which deals with current events and social issues. It aired weeknights on the Crossroads Television System, a multi-faith television network with affiliates in Ontario and Alberta...
on the Crossroads Television System
Crossroads Television System
Crossroads Television System, or CTS, is a privately held Canadian television system.CTS airs predominantly Christian-based religious programming, most notably 100 Huntley Street, The Michael Coren Show and LIFE Today with James & Betty Robison, as well as other religious and faith based...
from 1999 to 2011 when he moved to the Sun News Network to host an evening talk show, The Arena. He has also been a long-time radio personality, particularly on CFRB radio.
He has written more than ten books, including biographies of G.K. Chesterton, H. G. Wells
H. G. Wells
Herbert George Wells was an English author, now best known for his work in the science fiction genre. He was also a prolific writer in many other genres, including contemporary novels, history, politics and social commentary, even writing text books and rules for war games...
, Arthur Conan Doyle
Arthur Conan Doyle
Sir Arthur Ignatius Conan Doyle DL was a Scottish physician and writer, most noted for his stories about the detective Sherlock Holmes, generally considered a milestone in the field of crime fiction, and for the adventures of Professor Challenger...
, and C. S. Lewis
C. S. Lewis
Clive Staples Lewis , commonly referred to as C. S. Lewis and known to his friends and family as "Jack", was a novelist, academic, medievalist, literary critic, essayist, lay theologian and Christian apologist from Belfast, Ireland...
. His latest book, Why Catholics are Right, was published in 2011.
Life and career
Coren was born in EssexEssex
Essex is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in the East region of England, and one of the home counties. It is located to the northeast of Greater London. It borders with Cambridgeshire and Suffolk to the north, Hertfordshire to the west, Kent to the South and London to the south west...
, England
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
. After obtaining a degree in politics from Nottingham University, he moved from the UK to Canada in 1987. For several years, he was a columnist for Frank
Frank (magazine)
Frank is a bi-weekly Canadian scandal or satirical magazine published since 1987 in Halifax, Nova Scotia.A separate publication in Ottawa, Ontario, of the same name was published from 1989 to 2004 and then revived from 2005 to 2008...
and then The Globe and Mail
The Globe and Mail
The Globe and Mail is a nationally distributed Canadian newspaper, based in Toronto and printed in six cities across the country. With a weekly readership of approximately 1 million, it is Canada's largest-circulation national newspaper and second-largest daily newspaper after the Toronto Star...
, before he began syndicated columns for the Financial Post
Financial Post
The Financial Post was an English Canadian business newspaper, which published from 1907 to 1998. In 1998, the publication was folded into the new National Post, although the name Financial Post has been retained as the banner for that paper's business section and also lives on in the Post’s...
and Sun Media
Sun Media
Sun Media Corporation is the owner of several widely read tabloid and broadsheet newspapers in Canada and the 49 percent owner of Sun News Network...
in 1995. Following his departure from Frank, he became a favourite target of that publication, culminating in a spoof ad contest to "deflower" Michael Coren (a nod to Frank
His career as a broadcaster began in the early 1990s when he co-hosted a political debate segment with Irshad Manji
Irshad Manji
Irshad Manji is a Canadian author, journalist and an advocate of "reform and progressive" interpretation of Islam. Manji is director of the Moral Courage Project at the Robert F...
on TVOntario
TVOntario
TVOntario, often referred to only as TVO , is a publicly funded, educational English-language television station and media organization in the Canadian province of Ontario. It is operated by the Ontario Educational Communications Authority, a Crown corporation owned by the Government of Ontario...
's Studio 2
Studio 2
Studio 2 was a daily current affairs newsmagazine on TVOntario in Ontario, Canada. The show won several Gemini Awards, and was hosted by Steve Paikin and Paula Todd , and first aired in 1994. TVOntario announced the program's termination on June 29, 2006...
. In 1995, he began an evening talk show on CFRB
CFRB (AM)
CFRB, Newstalk 1010, is an AM radio clear-channel station in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, broadcasting on 1010 kHz, with a shortwave radio simulcast by CFRX-SW on 6.070 MHz. The station broadcasts a mix of talk and news throughout the day from its transmitter located in the community of...
. In 1999, Coren briefly moved to Talk 640
CFMJ (AM)
CFMJ is a Canadian radio station, broadcasting at 640 kHz on the AM dial. It is officially licensed to Richmond Hill, Ontario, but the studio is in the newly-constructed Corus Quay building, located at 125 Queens Quay East in Toronto...
for a short stint as its morning man. He returned to CFRB, where he hosted a show from 6:30 to 8:00 p.m. weekday nights, and regularly filled in for other hosts until November 2005. Coren was dismissed by CFRB as a result of complaints arising from comments ridiculing the weight of an apparent guest. In fact, the guest was an actor and the segment was scripted. According to CFRB's Operations Manager, Steve Kowch, "Pat Holiday, our general manager and myself went through the tape of Monday night's show and were shocked....it was totally out of bounds." Coren argues that it was a satire comparing in his mind public attitude to third world starvation with North America's obsession with slimming and self-indulgence. After moving to North America Coren gained one hundred pounds.
Despite this acrimonious termination, Coren made regular talk show appearances on CFRB in July 2006, at the start of the 2006 Israel-Lebanon conflict
2006 Israel-Lebanon conflict
The 2006 Lebanon War, also called the 2006 Israel-Hezbollah War and known in Lebanon as the July War #Other uses|Tammūz]]) and in Israel as the Second Lebanon War , was a 34-day military conflict in Lebanon, northern Israel and the Israeli-occupied territories. The principal parties were Hezbollah...
, as he happened to be in Israel at the time. After receiving 60% approval from CFRB listeners in an August 2006 poll, Coren returned to the CFRB airwaves in September 2006 with a Sunday evening show. As of the 22nd of April 2007, the show expanded from its usual 1 hour 7-8pm to 7-9 pm. Coren celebrated by giving away double the prizes usually given out. In the fall of 2007 he and former Liberal Party of Canada
Liberal Party of Canada
The Liberal Party of Canada , colloquially known as the Grits, is the oldest federally registered party in Canada. In the conventional political spectrum, the party sits between the centre and the centre-left. Historically the Liberal Party has positioned itself to the left of the Conservative...
president Stephen LeDrew
Stephen LeDrew
Stephen Ralph LeDrew is currently hosting CP24 Live at Noon, plus he is a Toronto-based lawyer and broadcast commentator. He served as President of the Liberal Party of Canada from 1998 to 2003, and was a Mayor of Toronto candidate in the 2006 municipal election.-Legal career:As a lawyer, LeDrew...
launched a daily hour-long afternoon show on CFRB called Two Bald Guys With Strong Opinions in which the two argue about the issues of the day. After the departure of LeDrew, Coren was joined by Tarek Fatah
Tarek Fatah
Tarek Fatah Urdu: طارق فتح is a Canadian political activist, writer, and broadcaster. He is the author of Chasing a Mirage: The Tragic Illusion of an Islamic State published by John Wiley & Sons. In the book Fatah challenges the notion that the establishment of an Islamic state is a necessary...
after several on air auditions by potential replacement co-hosts. Coren was again let go by CFRB along with 12 other staff of the Toronto radio station on 27 August 2009.
On television, Coren hosted the Michael Coren Show on the Crossroads Television System
Crossroads Television System
Crossroads Television System, or CTS, is a privately held Canadian television system.CTS airs predominantly Christian-based religious programming, most notably 100 Huntley Street, The Michael Coren Show and LIFE Today with James & Betty Robison, as well as other religious and faith based...
until June 2011 when he left to join the Sun News Network where he hosts The Arena weeknights on beginning August 30, 2011. Coren also has a newspaper column published every Saturday in the Sun newspaper chain. He has been a columnist for the Western Standard
Western Standard
The Western Standard is a Calgary, Alberta-based libertarian-conservative publication that billed itself as Canada's only conservative national news magazine...
, Catholic Insight and The Women's Post and has contributed to National Post
National Post
The National Post is a Canadian English-language national newspaper based in Don Mills, a district of Toronto. The paper is owned by Postmedia Network Inc. and is published Mondays through Saturdays...
, Reader's Digest
Reader's Digest
Reader's Digest is a general interest family magazine, published ten times annually. Formerly based in Chappaqua, New York, its headquarters is now in New York City. It was founded in 1922, by DeWitt Wallace and Lila Bell Wallace...
and several other publications. A self-professed Tottenham Hotspur
Tottenham Hotspur F.C.
Tottenham Hotspur Football Club , commonly referred to as Spurs, is an English Premier League football club based in Tottenham, north London. The club's home stadium is White Hart Lane....
fan, he has appeared as a guest host on The Score's The Footy Show. Coren is also a public speaker, particularly at religious gatherings.
Political controversies
In his earlier, satirical Aesthete column in Frank magazine Coren was by his own admission deliberately provocative. In response to a 1994 interview question about AIDSAIDS
Acquired immune deficiency syndrome or acquired immunodeficiency syndrome is a disease of the human immune system caused by the human immunodeficiency virus...
he responded:
- "Look, people are dying all over. When it was blacks in Africa dying of AIDS, no one gave a toss. Nobody gave a toss. Suddenly, it's middleclass men in California and everyone goes crazy about it. It's a double standard. I'm trying to provoke people into rethinking comfortable points of view."
In September 2006, Coren published an article in the Toronto Sun
Toronto Sun
The Toronto Sun is an English-language daily tabloid newspaper published in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It is known for its daily Sunshine Girl feature and for what it sees as a populist conservative editorial stance.-History:...
, supporting the use of tactical nuclear strikes against Iran. This position was later retracted.
On the subject of AIDS Michael Coren wrote a column in 2006 titled "Why is AIDS so special?" in which he said "At its most simple, stop fornicating." "AIDS in the West is still overwhelmingly a threat to male homosexuals and intravenous drug users."
In an article which appeared in Sun Media in 2007, Coren said "As for Jesus not condemning homosexuality, nor did He condemn bestiality and necrophilia."
Religious Views
His articles and speeches often include stories of his own personal spiritual journey. Coren's father was Jewish as was his maternal grandfather, while his maternal grandmother came from a family of WelshWales
Wales is a country that is part of the United Kingdom and the island of Great Britain, bordered by England to its east and the Atlantic Ocean and Irish Sea to its west. It has a population of three million, and a total area of 20,779 km²...
coalminers and converted to Judaism
Judaism
Judaism ) is the "religion, philosophy, and way of life" of the Jewish people...
. Coren's father and uncle were cab drivers. Coren has said that his father's family left Poland
Poland
Poland , officially the Republic of Poland , is a country in Central Europe bordered by Germany to the west; the Czech Republic and Slovakia to the south; Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania to the east; and the Baltic Sea and Kaliningrad Oblast, a Russian exclave, to the north...
a few decades before the Holocaust. He has also said that his father's family emigrated from Poland
Poland
Poland , officially the Republic of Poland , is a country in Central Europe bordered by Germany to the west; the Czech Republic and Slovakia to the south; Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania to the east; and the Baltic Sea and Kaliningrad Oblast, a Russian exclave, to the north...
in the 1890s. He said "People have called me an anti-Semite. I thought it quite rich since my father's family was massacred in the Holocaust". Michael Coren was profiled on Credo
Credo
A credo |Latin]] for "I Believe") is a statement of belief, commonly used for religious belief, such as the Apostles' Creed. The term especially refers to the use of the Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed in the Mass, either as text, Gregorian chant, or other musical settings of the...
, on Vision TV
Vision TV
VisionTV is a Canadian English language Category A specialty channel that broadcasts multi-faith, multicultural, and general entertainment programming aimed at the 45 and over demographic....
, and said that his father told him he could not attend his son's wedding in a Catholic Church without becoming "physically sick."
He converted to Roman Catholicism in his early twenties while still living in England
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
, but that didn't last long. He said that he "converted to an institution." He eventually converted to Evangelical
Evangelicalism
Evangelicalism is a Protestant Christian movement which began in Great Britain in the 1730s and gained popularity in the United States during the series of Great Awakenings of the 18th and 19th century.Its key commitments are:...
Christianity in the 1990s, after a conversion experience
Religious conversion
Religious conversion is the adoption of a new religion that differs from the convert's previous religion. Changing from one denomination to another within the same religion is usually described as reaffiliation rather than conversion.People convert to a different religion for various reasons,...
as an adult, greatly influenced by Canadian televangelist Terry Winter
Terry Winter
Terry Winter was a Canadian televangelist, who hosted The Terry Winter Show on Vision TV.Unlike some other Christian televangelists, Winter took an intellectual approach to faith...
.
In 1991 Michael Coren said in a column for a humour magazine: "The evangelical Christians may be intolerant, small-minded, and repellent, but at least they hold a consistent set of beliefs".
In a 1993 book review he said "Can anyone imagine a detective priest? Regrettably, it is easier to conjure up the image of a priest being questioned by secular detectives over abuse charges." Also in 1993, Michael Coren had a falling out with the Catholic Church over an unflattering profile he wrote of Archbishop Aloysius Ambrozic for Toronto
Toronto
Toronto is the provincial capital of Ontario and the largest city in Canada. It is located in Southern Ontario on the northwestern shore of Lake Ontario. A relatively modern city, Toronto's history dates back to the late-18th century, when its land was first purchased by the British monarchy from...
Life magazine. The Bishop, who made Coren a "Knight of the Holy Sepulchre" in a ceremony in October 1992, was quoted using words including "friggin" and "bitch", and said that Francisco Franco
Francisco Franco
Francisco Franco y Bahamonde was a Spanish general, dictator and head of state of Spain from October 1936 , and de facto regent of the nominally restored Kingdom of Spain from 1947 until his death in November, 1975...
was a "conservative Roman Catholic and not a bad fellow." Coren defended himself, saying "He's an archbishop and he was vulgar...obviously what thousands of Roman Catholics expected me to do was lie. I still get hate mail about the article."
After this incident, Coren said that he didn't consider himself a Roman Catholic anymore. He said "My wife is Catholic and the children will be raised Catholic, but that's it. It's just not there for me." Daniel Richler
Daniel Richler
Daniel Richler is a Canadian arts and pop culture broadcaster and writer. He is the stepson of author Mordecai Richler.-Biography:Born in London, England, his family moved back to his stepfather's hometown of Montreal when Daniel was 15...
observed that Coren loves scandal, but hates having it come his way. In one of his columns for the satirical humour magazine Frank
Frank (magazine)
Frank is a bi-weekly Canadian scandal or satirical magazine published since 1987 in Halifax, Nova Scotia.A separate publication in Ottawa, Ontario, of the same name was published from 1989 to 2004 and then revived from 2005 to 2008...
, Michael Coren depicted Mother Teresa
Mother Teresa
Mother Teresa , born Agnes Gonxha Bojaxhiu , was a Roman Catholic nun of Albanian ethnicity and Indian citizenship, who founded the Missionaries of Charity in Calcutta, India, in 1950...
getting drunk in a bar.
In early 2004, he embraced Catholicism again. He cites St. Thomas More
Thomas More
Sir Thomas More , also known by Catholics as Saint Thomas More, was an English lawyer, social philosopher, author, statesman and noted Renaissance humanist. He was an important councillor to Henry VIII of England and, for three years toward the end of his life, Lord Chancellor...
, C. S. Lewis
C. S. Lewis
Clive Staples Lewis , commonly referred to as C. S. Lewis and known to his friends and family as "Jack", was a novelist, academic, medievalist, literary critic, essayist, lay theologian and Christian apologist from Belfast, Ireland...
, Ronald Knox
Ronald Knox
Ronald Arbuthnott Knox was an English priest, theologian and writer.-Life:Ronald Knox was born in Kibworth, Leicestershire, England into an Anglican family and was educated at Eton College, where he took the first scholarship in 1900 and Balliol College, Oxford, where again...
and his godfather Lord Longford as spiritual influences, and remains connected to the ecumenical scene in Canada and beyond.
Published books
- Theatre Royal: 100 Years of Stratford East (1985) ISBN 0704324741
- Gilbert: The Man Who Was G.K. Chesterton (1990) ISBN 1557782563
- The Invisible Man: The Life and Liberties of H.G. Wells (1993) ISBN 0689121199
- The Life of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (1993) ISBN 0747512299
- The Man Who Created Narnia: The Story of C. S. Lewis (1994) ISBN 1895555787
- Setting It Right (1996) ISBN 0773729402
- J.R.R.Tolkien: The Man who Created the Lord of the Rings (2001) ISBN 0752261568
- As I See It (2009) ISBN 0981276709
- Why Catholics Are Right (2011) ISBN 0771023219
External links
- Official website
- Michael Coren's blog
- http://www.torontosun.com/comment/columnists/michael_coren/ Coren's column in The Toronto Sun