The pope had his audience laughing, but his jokes opened new cracks in Premier Silvio Berlusconi's coalition government Sunday.
Last week, Pope John Paul II triggered roars of laughter at the Vatican with one-liners made in Romanesco, the capital's earthy dialect. His audience, a roomful of Roman priests, loved it. So did Italy's news anchors, who played the Polish-born pope's banter over and over on that night's newscasts.
A Berlusconi ally, Reforms Minister Umberto Bossi, was not amused by the pope's playful affection for Romans. The gruff and often grumpy coalition partner has made anti-Roman diatribe part of his political base in northern Italy.
Bossi demanded the Roman Catholic Church no longer be entitled to a share of national income tax, which the state divvies up among religious organizations every year.
Affluent and largely industrial northern Italy "doesn't just maintain robber Rome, but also monsignors, cardinals and various rackets," Bossi said. "Let them go barefoot."
Reaction came quickly Sunday from coalition rivals, which have been squabbling for months as they jockey for more clout before June elections.
"Bossi has crossed the limit of decency," Deputy Premier Gianfranco Fini said in a statement carried by the Italian news agency ANSA.
One Cabinet Minister, Rocco Buttiglione, who has close ties to the Vatican, worried that Bossi was making Italy look bad abroad. "We're on the pope's side," said the minister, whose former Christian Democrat party is another coalition partner.
Another coalition leader, Marco Follini, said the problem was "not to take away resources from the Church but to give Bossi back his sanity," the Italian news agency Apcom reported.
The pope's jokes were prompted by good-natured chiding by a Roman pastor that while the polyglot pontiff greets pilgrims from around the world in their native languages, Romans don't hear the pope, who as pontiff is also bishop of Rome, speak Roman dialect.
John Paul, in rapid-fire, rattled off a string of Romanesco, including expressions for "Let's get down to business," ("damose da fa") and "We're Romans," ("semo Romani"). Then, in a retort to the pastor, he quipped: "I didn't learn Romanesco? Does that mean I'm not a good bishop of Rome?"
Berlusconi stayed out of the public fray but leaders of his Forza Italia party appeared to be working to distance their forces from Bossi.
Berlusconi is nearly three years through his five-year term at the helm of a center-right government.
Fini, the deputy premier, leads the National Alliance, a party with neo-fascist roots. On Sunday, Fini's Senate whip, Domenico Nania, threatened that if Bossi didn't stop his anti-Church and anti-Rome attacks, the party's senators would refuse to vote for Bossi's reforms to loosen the powers of Rome's strong central government.