Europe's future is on the line in Greece

With Greece's future in Europe on the line, European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker pulled off an emotional tour de force Monday as he sought to talk the country down from its perch at the edge of the abyss.

"I very much like the Greeks," he told reporters gravely during a Brussels news conference, "and I'd say to them, 'You should not commit suicide because you are afraid of death.' "

The choice facing Greece may indeed be that dire. But as the dramatic performance by the leader of one of the world's most hidebound bureaucracies showed, there is also an enormous amount at stake this week for Europe.

European officials have tried to signal at every turn that the continent is strong enough to weather the consequences of "Grexit," a Greek departure from the euro zone, and that the fears of a spreading contagion are overblown.

But the truth is that no one knows for sure what the broader consequences could be if a union forged over decades on the principle of ever-closer ties suddenly ejects one of its own, leaving it to a potentially catastrophic fate.

"Around the world, there's a growing incomprehension that the Europeans have allowed something like this to spin out of control," said Simon Tilford, deputy director of the Center for European Reform. "It could be very damaging to European credibility."

Beyond the psychological effects, Tilford said that European officials are deluding themselves if they think that other vulnerable economies along Europe's southern periphery will be protected from a fate similar to Greece's. That may be true, he said, when economies are in recovery, but not when another recession hits.

"Once you have the next downturn, which may not be very far away, the consequences of Grexit will become apparent," he said. "They can control the short-term contagion. But there's also the longer-term contagion."

And yet, exasperated E.U. officials say that Greece can't be saved at all costs and have begun to hint that amputating the diseased Hellenic limb may be the only way to rescue the European patient.

Juncker on Monday pleaded with the Greek people to vote "yes" in a Sunday referendum on whether or not to accept the European creditors' terms and stay in the euro zone. "It is time for Greeks to speak up and to shape their own destiny," he said.

But he also excoriated the country's leadership, accusing Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras of breaking his promises and lying to his own people. He also suggested that Greece's unyielding negotiating positions were undermining the broader project of European unity, one he said he had spent his life promoting.

"Playing one democracy against 18 others is not an attitude worthy of the great Greek nation," Juncker said.

Greek officials, who are urging voters to say "no" on Sunday, immediately seized on the comments as fresh evidence of European arrogance and interference in what should be a decision for the Greek people. Some also bridled at Juncker's reference to suicide, the rates of which have surged in Greece as the economy has sunk into depression.

Greece and Europe have been on a collision course since January, when voters chose the radical leftist Syriza party to take charge in Athens. The party ran on a platform of not only remaking Greece but also abandoning what it sees as a disastrous European fealty to the economics of austerity.

But for reasons both economic and political, the heavyweights of Europe haven't wanted to hand Syriza a victory. Both sides have dug in, and now they are on the brink of a breakup — even though they share the ostensible goal of keeping Greece solvent and inside the euro.

An exit could have implications for Europe that go well beyond the economic. Greece has been the first stop for tens of thousands of migrants fleeing conflict in the Middle East and Asia, and a collapse of Greek authority could exacerbate what has already become a crisis for the continent.

The geopolitical consequences, too, could be severe. Russia has actively courted Greece, seeking to exploit the country's weakness to gain leverage with a NATO member.

But the economic impacts are the ones that could be most keenly felt. The euro launched in 1999 with the goal of binding the continent together after the catastrophic divisions that had marked the previous century. Since then, the currency has added members but has never lost one — a measure of just how important it is for European officials to preserve the sense that the union is unbreakable.

"If the euro fails," said German Chancellor Angela Merkel on Monday in a now-common refrain, "Europe fails."