Since the site is dynamically generated, perhaps it would be possible to change the Welcome to be a descriptive welcome as outlined, but allow monks to 'edit' their front-page so that it contained Newest Nodes, or whatever they wanted to see when they first logged in.

This would allow the site to be welcoming and descriptive for new users but also dynamically modifiable to whatever would prove useful to more seasoned monks.

Of course, I have no idea if this would bomb the server so the point may be just wishful thinking