Western Rite Roman Catholicism has the Pope. Eastern Orthodoxy has the Patriarch of Constantinople. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints has its President.
What other religions have a single person at the top?
The Gelug school of Tibetan Buddhism, led by the “Ganden Tripa” (and not the Dalai Lama as is popularly thought).
If you define it that loosely, then lots do. Tibetan Buddhism has the Dalai Lama. Hinduism has various schools with single leaders within them. Bahai did have one, but he died and they’ve been a bit adrift since then. The Ayatollah Khameini is arguably the marja of Shia Islam. Shintoism has traditionally been headed by the Emperor of Japan, but the US forbade that in 1945.
Christianity tends to have hierarchical elements because it was founded during the Roman era and the Romans were masters of organization. Original Christianity was much less hierarchical in nature and more free form. It took on a lot of organization similar to synagogues at the time. It was only after the Edict of Milan that we saw it really start to turn into its current form. What was happening was that as the late Roman Empire was crumbling, the church was forced to step in and provide many of the functions of government that were previously done by the state. This increased the power of various diocese greatly and you end up in a situation where the church was indistinguishable from the state during portions of late antiquity and the early Middle Ages. There was a need for these various semi-autonomous political entities to work together and they created a lot of the structure you see today modeled heavily on the Roman Republic - the pope serving as essentially an elected consul with a ‘Senate’ composed of Cardinals and bishops in the role of ‘proconsuls.’
The Patriarch of Constantinople isn’t the head of all of the Eastern Orthodox churches. The Orthodox recognize a number of Patriarchs (including, incidentally, the Pope), as each having authority over the Church in their own geographical region.
Which is similar to the Anglican Communion, as discussed in an ongoing GQ thread.
Orthodoxy and Anglicanism are both episcopal in structure, but auto-céphalique. There is no single person in charge of the various national churches.
Nor do the primates of the Anglican churches have the organisational or doctrinal authority that the Pope has in the Catholic Church.
David Miscavige is the head of Scientology. His official titles are Chairman of the Board of the Religious Technology Center (the corporation which holds Scientology’s various intellectual properties) and Captain of the Sea Organization (which is the administrative office which runs Scientology).
Pretty much every cult, Scientology included, has a single person at its head. That’s kind of how cults work.
“At the top” has extremely different meanings, depending on how the followers treat the leader.
It can mean the leader is an object of worship.
It can mean object of worship plus gets you to give up your autonomy and maybe steals your money (i.e. cults).
Or (if the Anglican Communion really has a leader) it can mean “he has to host the meetings but nobody has to listen to him”. 
Nitpick: He’s the Visible Head.
Can’t agree here. His influence is large, but he isn’t even on top of Ithna’ashari Shi’ism. Frankly there is( relatively speaking )a slew of Ithna’ashari marjaji out there - wiki counted 64 living in 2014.
Never mind that of course Zaydi and Isma’ili Shi’a don’t give a hoot about any of the above ;).
The Aga Khan is the head of the Nizari Ismaili Muslims.
Mirza Masroor Ahmad is the caliph of the Ahmadi Muslims.
There’s a Coptic pope in Cairo. Most of the Christians in Egypt and thereabouts are Coptic.
Egypt actually has two popes.
There is the Coptic Orthodox Church of Alexandria, run by Pope Tawadros II (aka Theodore II), “His Holiness the Pope of Alexandria & Patriarch of All Africa on the Holy Apostolic See of Saint Mark the Evangelist of the Coptic Orthodox Church of Alexandria”. This church is part of the Oriental Orthodox communion, which split off from the rest of Christianity after the Council of Chalcedon in AD 451.
There is the Greek Orthodox Church of Alexandria, run by Patriarch Theodore II of Alexandria, “His Divine Beatitude the Pope and Patriarch of the Great City of Alexandria, Libya, Pentapolis, Ethiopia, All Egypt and All Africa, Father of Fathers, Pastor of Pastors, Prelate of Prelates, the Thirteenth of the Apostles and Judge of the Ecumene”. This church is part of the Eastern Orthodox communion, which split off from the Roman Catholics in the Great Schism of AD 1054.
Yes, Orthodox Christianity is not well understood by most people in the West. Hell, if you asked the average American what it is, maybe half of them could tell you, “it’s the religion that Russians and Greeks practice.” The diversity of different rites and variations of it is fascinating to me.
right but it’s interesting to note that the Dalai Lama picks the Ganden Tripa. A new Ganden Tripa was picked last year when the prior one died.
For the French-impaired, the English term is “autocephalous”.
Eh, it’s Greek to me.
Even the Catholic church has, IIRC, 18 rites - Roman rite just happens to be the biggest of the bunch by a long shot. There’s Armenian, Ukrainian, etc. Ukrainian Rite Catholic priests are allowed to marry. Not long after the USSR collapsed, there was a Ukrainian bishop who got in trouble with Rome for ordaining too many priests, including some in Canada. The Vatican had an arrangement with Moscow to limit the number of married priests, which was a benefit to both sides since Moscow didn’t want to encourage religion and Rome didn’t want too many married priests causing questions to be raised in the west about celibacy requirements.