You don't. Offense is inevitable.
There's a comment Charly left on my previous post that got me thinking about it:
"Does the Bible have to be non-fiction to have value?"
My initial response: No. Of course not. Are the works of Shakespeare fiction or non-fiction? They're fiction, though some are based on true historical events. But would The Bible need to be considered non-fiction to be studied in schools?
Does the genre really matter all that much when you're studying it for its literary content? Maybe it does. I guess that's what I'm wondering. There's so much controversy over how to categorize the Bible. Here are some screenshots of discussion comments left regarding this very question.