11 . At the present time, it is uncertain whether politicians voting for measures that enable others to have abortions are "accomplices" subject to automatic excommunication. In 1988, the Vatican attempted to remove any doubt regarding the legal meaning of "abortion" by defining it as "any method used to terminate human life from the moment of conception until birth." This definition is so broad that a medical doctor allowing a fertilized ovum in a petri dish to dry out commits an abortion. So does any woman knowingly using an IUD while having intercourse with her husband (see www.trosch.org/ccl-abor.htm).