Where's the essence?

Popularizing secular Buddhism in the West has been effective for a number of reasons but one reason stands out the most. Secularizing Buddhism is done for the purpose of stripping away its cultural facade while at the same time preserving Buddhisms essence.

Now while this sounds okay to the uncritical mind, I think what has ended up happening with secular Buddhism in the West is that the cultural trappings have been largely preserved, for example, the wearing of Japanese style robes, while what has been stripped away, over time, has been the very essence of Buddhism!

If the aforesaid is, in fact, true then Buddhism, over time, eventually becomes a product of cultural trappings, that is, a hodgepodge mainly of Asian cultural forms (dress, ceremony, etc.), which contain little if any of Buddhisms original essence. As for Buddhisms essence, I would go so far as to speculate that, over time, this essence will have been replaced with some form of materialism or phenomenalism.

I should also add that if there is any question as to what is the original essence of Buddhism, one need not look any further than Siddharthas awakening by which he became Buddha.

The Dharma obtained by me is profound, of deep splendor, difficult to see, difficult to understand, incomprehensible, having the incomprehensible as its scope, fine, subtle, the sense of which can only be understood by the wise (Catusparisat Sutra).

Following Siddharthas awakening, that is, becoming Buddha, his ministry was chiefly about teaching his most worthy followers (arya) how to awaken fully to what he, the Buddha, had previously awakened to. Frankly, I dont find secular Buddhism to be all that interested in what, exactly, Siddharthas Dharma was whereby he became awakened; a Dharma which can only be understood by the wise. I have serious doubts that it had anything to do with bringing mindfulness and awareness into our everyday secular life which seems t! o be the practice of secular Buddhists.